(soft relaxed music)
- Hey.
This is an antiracism listening list.
Black lives matter,
and the fight for racial justice is up to all of us.
This list is to help if you're not sure where to start.
We're beginning
with "Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race"
by Reni Eddo-Lodge.
In this book,
Reni looks at what it is to be Black and British.
She'll take you through Britain's role in the slave trade,
through how our nation is in denial of its racism,
and into those conversations with white people
she will no longer put herself through.
This audiobook voices the frustration
that Reni and so many other Black people rightly feel,
and this is one route for white people
to really listen without putting the burden
back on their Black friends and family.
It is a great place to begin for antiracism self-education.
- [Reni] Thinking about power made me realize
that racism was about so much more than personal prejudice.
It was about being in the position
to negatively affect other people's life chances.
My outlook began to change drastically.
- Next is "The Hate U Give" by Angie Thomas.
This young adult novel is a great listen
for adults and children alike.
Fiction is a brilliant way
to understand others and different experiences.
You might have heard of or seen the film of this book,
which is great.
If you haven't
and want to add a watch to your education list,
I would definitely recommend.
The book follows 16-year-old Starr, whose life is split
between the poor neighborhood where she was born
and her posh high school in the suburbs.
That balancing act comes to an uncomfortable end
when her best friend Khalil is shot by a police officer.
This book was inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement.
- [Narrator] Kenya is about the only person
I hang out with in Garden Heights.
It's hard to make friends
when you go to a school that's 45 minutes away
and you're a latchkey kid
who's only seen at her family's store.
It's easy to hang out with Kenya
because of our connection to Seven.
She's messy as hell sometimes, though.
Always fighting somebody
and quick to say her daddy will whoop somebody's ass.
- Next is a nonfiction listen:
"How to Be an Antiracist" by Ibram X. Kendi.
This book shows how neutrality is not an option
when it comes to racism.
If you aren't being actively antiracist,
you're contributing to the problem.
Ibram is the founding director
of The Antiracism Research and Policy Center,
and he is a great teacher.
In this book, he helps us to recognize
that everyone is, at times, complicit in racism,
and he shows us how to be a force for good instead.
The review section on Audible for this book
will give you a powerful sense
of how highly recommended it is.
- [Ibram] I thought I was a subpar student
and was bombarded by messages,
from Black people, white people, the media,
that told me that the reason was rooted in my race,
which made me more discouraged
and less motivated as a student,
which only further reinforced for me the racist idea
that Black people just weren't very studious,
which made me feel even more despair or indifference,
and on it went.
- We have Layla Saad's book next, "Me and White Supremacy."
In Layla's words, this is not a book you read,
it's a book you do.
Each chapter takes you through a different element
of racism and white supremacy,
explaining a lot of the terms you might hear,
like tone policing, the adultification of Black children,
white fragility, white guilt, et cetera.
And it allows you to examine
how your reactions or lack of action,
and sometimes just thoughts, in certain situations,
have seen you further different elements
of white supremacy.
So this means upholding a system
that is harming and oppressing BIPOC,
Black, Indigenous, and People of Color.
Each day for 28 days,
you'll journal your thoughts
using the prompts in the audiobook,
helping you to take ownership
of your own personal antiracism work.
- [Layla] Dear listener,
how did you feel the first time
you saw the title of this audiobook?
Were you surprised?
Confused?
Intrigued?
Uncomfortable?
Maybe all of the above?
I want to begin by reassuring you
that all those feelings and more are completely normal.
- Next is "Natives" by Akala.
Akala's book was recommended
to me first by Benjamin Zephaniah,
who wrote a review line for "Natives"
saying that it is the book he had been waiting for
for years.
It's Akala's story of how race
and class have shaped his life,
and how, more broadly,
society and politics function in Britain now
and how we got where we are.
Akala calls out the institutional racism
that might seem more covert,
but is deeply damaging in both institutions of power
and in our subconscious thoughts and actions.
It's great to hear the audiobook,
which is narrated by Akala.
And if you're lamenting
not learning more honest history in school,
this book will start to bridge that knowledge gap.
- [Akala] It's easy for people
just slightly younger than myself
and born into a relative degree of multiculturalism
to forget just how recently basic public decency
towards Black folks was won in this country,
but I was born in the 1980s,
so I remember only too well.
- To learn more about history, we have the podcast
"In Search of Black History with Bonnie Greer."
History is not just the majority white men narrative
that fills so many history books and lessons.
In this podcast,
Bonnie tells us about some of those people
from African descent through the ages
who were saints, philosophers,
warrior women, king's heralds,
and brings their stories to life.
- [Bonnie] Tudor England was also a landscape
of Black people, many free and vigorous and robust,
living in an England of living color,
a country in which we lived and worked
and did not go unnoticed.
I'll be taking you back there
to meet some truly extraordinarily individuals
and exploring what was happening in Africa
during the same period.
- Next is "White Fragility" by Robin DiAngelo.
Robin DiAngelo coined the term white fragility in 2011
to describe the emotional response
that many white people show
when they are called out around unintentional racism.
This reaction makes it harder
for racial hurt or offense to be spoken about
and often silences Black people,
who shouldn't have to deal
with this potentially damaging emotional response.
This book shows how we can start
to have more honest conversations,
and it helps white people make sure
that we are really listening.
- [Narrator] It is not enough
to be a rhetorician and a semiotician
to deconstruct and demythologize whiteness.
One must be a magician of the political and the social,
an alchemist of the spiritual and psychological too.
One must wave off racist stereotypes
and conjure a rich history of combating white supremacy
and white privilege and white lies,
a history that has often been buried deep
in the dark, rich, black American soil.
- Now we have "Naughts & Crosses" by Malorie Blackman.
This was one of my favorite books growing up.
It follows the relationship between Sephy and Callum.
Sephy is a member of the dark-skinned ruling class,
and Callum is one of the colorless underclass
who were born slaves.
They've been friends for years,
but this society would frown
upon any romantic relationship between the two.
This is such a brilliant children's book,
and actually whole series,
as there are currently five books out
with a sixth on the way.
- [Narrator] "I was just thinking
about my son and your daughter.
Wouldn't it be nice if...?"
Appalled, she bit back the rest of the sentence,
but it was too late.
"What would be nice?" Mr. Hadley prompted, silkily.
"If they could... could always stay as they are now."
- "Until the Flood" by Dael Orlandersmith
is an award-winning play.
This audio recording is lyrical
and beautifully performed by the author.
The story is inspired by interviews
which took place following the 2014 shooting
of a Black teenager, Michael Brown,
by white police officer Darren Wilson.
It delves into different perspectives
of a community who need justice,
and it sucks you right into the story.
- [Dael] It seemed to me that they were passive racially.
Seemed to me my father was the kind of man
who did not outstep his bounds.
There was that racism, too.
Oh, certainly, there was the violence,
but there was the understood, quiet racism
where everyone knew their place.
- Next is "We Need to Talk About the British Empire"
by Afua Hirsch.
And we really do need to talk about the British Empire.
I didn't study it until history at university,
and that is mad.
So many of us either ignore or are ignorant
to the havoc and pain that Britain caused,
to our role in the slave trade,
and to what our true inheritance and legacy
as a country is.
In this podcast,
Afua hears from guests about their family stories
who made the Empire what it was,
and she digs into how the Empire shaped Britain today.
Why not use this podcast as a jumping-off point
for exploring more of Britain's history
and the perspectives from historians around the past?
- [Interviewee] We never discussed the Empire at home,
and I tell you what made me very aware
that there was something missing,
was television.
I watched a lot of TV growing up,
and I just remember thinking,
there are no documentaries telling me about my history.
- And finally, "Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You,"
by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi.
This book is to help you better understand
why we are where we are when it comes to race,
and it's about what we can each do about racism now.
The writing and delivery of this audiobook makes it feel
like listening to a discussion or a conversation,
accessible for teens and up,
which makes it a great listen
for a family with high school age children.
Many reviewers have said how captivated they were
by this audiobook.
- [Jason] If not for racist ideas,
George Zimmerman would not have thought
the hooded Florida teen who liked LeBron James,
hip hop, and "South Park" had to be a robber.
Zimmerman's racist ideas in 2012
transformed an easygoing Trayvon Martin,
walking home from a 7/11
holding watermelon juice and Skittles,
into a menace to society, holding danger.
- So, that rounds off this antiracism listening list.
There are lots of other brilliant audiobooks available
around the topics of race and racism
in both fiction and nonfiction.
This is just a selection for you to explore, listen to,
and to help you begin your lifelong antiracism work.
Thanks for watching.
(soft relaxed music)