Open Wound

The Long View of Race in America

By: William McKee Evans

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Hardcover | 14 November 2009

At a Glance

Hardcover
344 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
24.77 x 15.88 x 2.54

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In this boldly interpretive narrative, William McKee Evans tells the story of America's paradox of democracy entangled with a centuries-old system of racial oppression. This racial system of interacting practices and ideas first justified black slavery, then, after the Civil War, other forms of coerced black labor and, today, black poverty and unemployment.

At three historical moments, a crisis in the larger society opened political space for idealists to challenge the racial system: during the American Revolution, then during the "irrepressible conflict" ending in the Civil War, and, finally, during the Cold War and the colonial liberation movements. Each challenge resulted in an historic advance. But none swept clean. Many African Americans remain segregated in jobless ghettoes with dilapidated schools and dismal prospects in an increasingly polarized class society.

Evans sees a new crisis looming in a convergence of environmental disaster, endless wars, and economic collapse, which may again open space for a challenge to the racial system. African Americans, with their memory of their centuries-old struggle against oppressors, appear uniquely placed to play a central role.

Industry Reviews

''A penetrating look at the complicated history of race in America.''--Booklist''William McKee Evans is that rare scholar who writes clearly and well, displays an impressive grasp of the smaller facts of history, and yet can rise above the fray of footnotes to make sweeping and extraordinarily telling historical observations. This book represents the capstone of a remarkable career, and it is his most expansive and well considered work.''--Timothy B. Tyson, author of Blood Done Sign My Name: A True Story ''In analyzing key developments and moments of crisis over nearly four hundred years, William McKee Evans brings to bear an extraordinary command not only of the established historical literature on North America, but an impressive grasp of historiography from the wider Atlantic world. The result is a surefooted, authoritative study that radically reframes an old story, drawing fresh and compelling insights from some of the most studied events in the American past.''--Brian Kelly, author of Race, Class, and Power in the Alabama Coalfields, 1908-21

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