So You Want to Talk About Race

Book, 2018

Premise - Seattle-based writer Ijeoma Oluo shares her advice for people on how to discuss the emotionally sensitive topic of race relations in America. Particularly for those with racial privilege, she provides contextual information on historical and systemic racism so that those entering a conversation about race will have adequate knowledge to engage.

Review - As someone who is also Seattle-based, this book hit me hard. Seattle is both very liberal, and very segregated. The white parts of town are exceedingly white, and the black parts of town are hidden in the central and south districts. This allows for white liberals to really feel like we are a more progressive city than we are, as the black community as a whole is just something we don't really interact with. It never really hit me until I started volunteering in schools within Seattle's central districts, where in the "remedial" classes, 100% of students were youth of color. So there are a few possible experiences of being black in Seattle. Either you are one of the 2% that live in our white towns, seen as one of the only black folks and a rarity, or you're invisible and hidden in those neighborhoods of color. Ijeoma does an interesting job of admitting to a divide between the middle-class, educated, perhaps even pretentious blacks that she belonged to and the lower class black community she felt alienated from.

While I was in awe of all of her location-specific anecdotes, the book holds strong for all Americans. It serves as incredible foundational material for the state of race relations from the perspective of a black woman. It also covers a range of incredibly important and relevant topics, all the way from police brutality to black hair. For anybody that does not understand that protests against police did NOT begin with George Floyd, this is a good read considering it was published in 2018.

When I read these kinds of books with provocative titles, I do always wonder how it may appear to those who do not share the same progressive mindset as myself. The ratings on this book are very high, as they should be, but is that an echo chamber of those who are willing to talk about race? Obviously Ijeoma did not want to waste her time trying to write for explicit racists, but would those who lean more centrist look at this book and just from the title say "Nope"? I have no idea. I may have been scared to confront this book a few years ago though, to be fair.

I believe what strikes me most are Ijeoma's comments that she doesn't want to be talking about race. She doesn't want to have to write about it. In a world where racial equity already exists, she'd want to write fun mystery novels and she'd be great at it. But this is a world where racism remains strong, and she has to talk about it. We all do and that sucks, more for her than me. (94/100)

Quote - “Racial oppression should always be an emotional topic to discuss. It should always be anger-inducing. As long as racism exists to ruin the lives of countless people of color, it should be something that upsets us. But it upsets us because it exists, not because we talk about it.”

What to read for - The chapters that stood out most to me were the ones about the school-to-prison pipeline, the model minority myth (eyy Asians), and how to act after we've done all this talking.

Also, my local library system KCLS did a livestream with the author talking about Black joy and liberation for Juneteenth and I watched it. The video was posted on YouTube and is quite funny.

If you liked this book, I'd recommend Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race!

Written by Ijeoma Oluo

Published by Seal Press