★★★★★☆☆
Title: How To Be An Antiracist
Author/narrator: Ibram X Kendi
Genre: Non-Fiction/racism/social issues
First published: 2019
Edition: Audio book
In this book, Kendi weaves together an electrifying combination of ethics, history, law, and science, bringing it all together with an engaging personal narrative of his own awakening to antiracism.
Let me start off with thoroughly recommending the audio book of this one. The author speaks with such passion and heart that I hung onto his every word. At least for while.
I was intrigued by the overarching idea of this book. In every chapter Kendi discusses a type of racism and applies it to his own experiences and the current issues with it. He discusses his own prejudices, which encouraged me to look at my own.
In these current times we should be confronted by our own prejudices and be made aware of our own subconscious ideas surrounding race. This book does a good job of making you think about what you could change about yourself and your community. It does not necessarily tell you how, but it gives you a good understanding how each type of racism affects society and how it has came to be. I know I will be looking at the world around me a little differently for sure.
The author is clearly very passionate about what he is telling us and his passion is contagious. I do not know enough about the subject, especially in the US, to know whether his arguments were well founded. They sure sounded well researched to me and he managed to convey them in a compelling way a lot of the time.
The author did lose me a bit in the final third of the book, as it started being a bit repetitive. Although I was interested in the subject still, I started feeling like I had heard it all before earlier in the book.
I will try and read some more books on this subject soon. I am glad that more people reading up on social issues right now and I hope that will continue into the future. Simple self education can kickstart change in yourself, which can then be projected into your wider world. I would like to put more time and effort in researching social injustices across the board. To be aware and to make others aware is a good starting point.
This book is definitely worth reading and it deals with such an important subject. I definitely came out wiser. Now I feel it’s up to me to take it further and educate myself as much as I can.
5 out of 7 stars
Lola Et La Vie 