Historian, author and activist Paul Street has high praise for James Forman Jr.’s new book, Locking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America. Forman is a professor at Yale Law School and a former public defender in Washington, DC. His book “fills a giant hole in the literature,” illuminating the role played by “Black elites in the rise of the mass incarceration system,” said Street, himself an expert on race and the U.S. penal system. “Many ordinary, working class Black voters in the 70s and 80s have actively supported the racially disparate war on crime and drugs that ended up producing racist mass incarceration,” said Street, whose latest book is titled They Rule: The 1% v. Democracy.
For Black August, read William L. Patterson on racial genocide, the law, and the Martinsville Seven.
One year ago the U.S. was ousted from Afghanistan after making war on that country for 20 years. But the U.S. killed civilians as it left and stole Afghanistan's assets. It seems there is no end to…
…
This week’s featured author is Boukary Sawadogo. Sawadogo is Associate Professor of Cinema Studies and Black Studies at City College–City University of New York. His book is Africans in Harlem: An…
Ahjamu Umi and Roberto Sirvent discuss revolutionary organizing.
