ECONORACISM:The Next Great Divide examines the current social strife, unrest, and dissatisfaction occurring throughout the world as the physical manifestation of an economic class struggle masquerading as racial discrimination. The divide between rich and poor has grown visibly and statistically throughout the world, and this divide displays itself through genocide, isolation, and disparity in all elements of the human social structure: education, health and health care, housing a...

First published in 1903, William Edward Burghardt Du Bois' "The Souls of Black Folk" is a seminal work in African American literature and an American classic.In this work Du Bois proposes that "the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line." His concepts of life behind the veil of race and the resulting "double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others," have become touchstones for thinking about race in America. In...

On a May morning in 1939, eighteen-year-old Velma Demerson and her lover were having breakfast when two police officers arrived to take her away. Her crime was loving a Chinese man, a “crime” that was compounded by her pregnancy and subsequent mixed-race child. Sentenced to a home for wayward girls, Demerson was then transferred (along with forty-six other girls) to Torontos Mercer Reformatory for Females. The girls were locked in their cells for twelve hours a day and required to work in ...

In 1836, Irving published " Astoria ; or, Anecdotes of an Enterprise beyond the Rocky Mountains ;" a somewhat curious example of literary skill. A voluminous commercial correspondence was the dull ore of the earth which he refined and wrought into symmetry and splendor. Irving reduced to a regular narrative the events to which it referred, bringing out the picturesque whenever he found it, and enlivening the whole with touches of his native humor. His nephew, Pierre M. Irving, lightened his...

Mary Austin's "The Land of Little Rain" is a lyrical exploration of the natural beauty and stark realities of the high desert of California. Through a series of evocative essays, Austin masterfully intertwines the landscape's physicality with its cultural and spiritual significance to native peoples and settlers alike. Her keen observations render the region's flora and fauna not merely as backdrop but as integral characters in the unfolding narrative, reflecting her empathetic engagement ...

A harrowing story of blue on black violence, of black lives that seemingly did not matter.On September 4, 2005, six days after Hurricane Katrina’s landfall in New Orleans, two groups of people intersected on the Danziger Bridge, a low-rising expanse over the Industrial Canal. One was the police who had stayed behind as Katrina roared near, desperate to maintain control as their city spun into chaos. The other was the residents forced to stay behind with them during...

FROM THE VERY FOUNDING OF OUR NATION, diversity has been one of our greatest strengths but also the greatest source of conflict. In less than a generation, America will become "minority-majority," and the world economy, already interconnected, will be even more globalized. The stakes for how we handle this evolution couldn't be higher. Will diversity be a source of growth, prosperity, and progress-or perpetual division and strife?America has the potential to realize...

When the tornado roared across southern Missouri, southern Illinois, and southwestern Indiana for many hours during the afternoon on March 18th in 1925, there was now way that people along the tornado path would know it was occurring before they could see it. This was because there was no radar systems then and the National Weather Service was not able to let people know that a tornado was going to occur or that there was a tornado already occurring since they did not know much about torna...

The "well-written and compelling history" of a 1922 racist reign of terror in a small Texas town—now updated with a shocking deathbed confession ( USA Today).What happened in Kirven, Texas, in May 1922, has been forgotten by the outside world. But in Flames After Midnight, historian Monte Akers uncovers the true story behind a young white woman's brutal murder and the burning alive of three black men who were almost certainly innocent of it. This ...

In the early 1900s, panic over the arrival of South Asian immigrants swept up and down the west coast of North America. While racism and fear of labour competition were at the heart of this furor, public leaders – including physicians, union leaders, civil servants, journalists, and politicians – latched on to unsubstantiated public health concerns to justify the exclusion of South Asians from British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and California. Not Fit to Stay examines how and w...

Bittersweet Legacy is the dramatic story of the relationship between two generations of black and white southerners in Charlotte, North Carolina, from 1850 to 1910. Janette Greenwood describes the interactions between black and white business and professional people — the 'better classes,' as they called themselves. Her book paints a surprisingly complex portrait of race and class relations in the New South and demonstrates the impact of personal relationships, generational shifts...

In 1888 a group of armed and masked Democrats stole a ballot box from a small town in Conway County, Arkansas. The box contained most of the county’s black Republican votes, thereby assuring defeat for candidate John Clayton in a close race for the U.S. Congress. Days after he announced he would contest the election, a volley of buckshot ripped through Clayton’s hotel window, killing him instantly. Thus began a yet-to-be-solved, century-old mystery.More than a description of this p...