The Color of Crime (Second Edition): Racial Hoaxes, White Fear, Black Protectionism, Police Harassment, and Other Macroaggressions (Critical America (New York University Paperback)) [Paperback]

Katheryn Russell-Brown (Author)

Book Description

Release date: December 1, 2008 | ISBN-10: 0814776183 | ISBN-13: 978-0814776186 | Edition: 2

When The Color of Crime was first published ten years ago, it was heralded as a path-breaking book on race and crime. Now, in its tenth anniversary year, Katheryn Russell-Brown's book is more relevant than ever. The Jena Six, Duke Lacrosse Team, Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, James Byrd, and all of those victimized in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina are just a few of the racially fueled cases that have made headlines in the past decade.

Russell-Brown continues to ask, why do Black and White Americans perceive police actions so differently? Is White fear of Black crime justified? Do African Americans really protect their own? Should they? And why are we still talking about O.J.? Russell-Brown surveys the landscape of American crime and identifies some of the country's most significant racial pathologies. In this new edition, each chapter is updated and revised, and two new chapters have been added. Enriched with twenty-five new cases, the explosive and troublesome chapter on "Racial Hoaxes" demonstrates that "playing the race card" is still a popular ploy.

The Color of Crime is a lucid and forceful volume that calls for continued vigilance on the part of journalists, scholars, and policymakers alike. Through her innovative analysis of cases, ideological and media trends, issues, and practices that resonate below the public radar even in the new century, Russell-Brown explores the tacit and subtle ways that deviance is systematically linked to people of color. Her findings are impossible to ignore.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Feigenson and Spiesel persuasively argue for a more critical and contextualizing approach to the growing flood of digital imagery in the courtroom. Given the enormous power of imagery to sway opinions and the innovative ways in which visuals can now be presented, judges, jurors, and especially lawyers are obligated to know how to interrogate these new forms of evidence and explication. Law on Display serves as a timely and comprehensive introduction to digital visual literacy in the legal system."
-Fred Ritchin, author of "After Photography"

About the Author

Katheryn Russell-Brown is Professor of Law and director of the Center for the Study of Race and Race Relations at the University of Florida's Levin College of Law. She is the author of Protecting Our Own: Race, Crime, and African Americans and Underground Codes: Race, Crime, and Related Fires (NYU Press).

Product Details

• Paperback: 223 pages
• Publisher: NYU Press; 2 edition (December 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0814776183
• ISBN-13: 978-0814776186
• Product Dimensions: 5.8 x 0.6 x 8.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #289,158 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Thorough, insightful, and thought-provoking book on matters of race and crime February 19, 2013

By SimpleIntellect

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

This book should be required reading for both academics and average-Joes alike who are interested in the role that race has played and continues to play in the American criminal justice system--or those who are interested in the American racial order at all. Russell-Brown skillfully lays out the historical development of race in our justice system, and she shows how our current system (including the laws themselves, the implementation of the law, etc.) is a legacy of this race-based past. She does a great job presenting the facts without using too much complicated academic jargon or being preachy--and her adherence to just the facts makes it difficult for dissenters to make reasonable claims of an unfounded slant. Read this book for an insightful take on race and the criminal justice system.

1 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Required Reading December 18, 2012

By D.H.

Format:Paperback

Dr. Russell-Brown's text is required reading for most undergraduate and graduate-level courses on race and crime, and for good reason. I have read dozens of books on the matter and I always come back to this one as a source of reference. Plus, it will difficult to find another book on the topic that does not reference this text (first edition). I think the second edition is even better than the first. It's more inclusive (racially) and, of course, includes more contemporary issues that should make it easier for anyone to grasp the connections between societal construction of race and its consequences for the criminal justice system. Despite what the previous reviewer stated, Dr. Russell-Brown does an excellent job of not only using crime statistics, but also pointing out how official statistics can sometimes be misleading. I would highly recommend it to anyone who is actually open to receiving information that may not conform to preconceived notions about race and crime.

4 of 12 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Read November 6, 2010

By Ernest

Format:Paperback

In this book Katheryn Russell-Brown discusses black Americans and the criminal justice system. Specifically, this book focuses on how different racial groups are depicted by the media, present racial discrimination that black Americans face in the course of their everyday lives, the history of race and criminal justice in the United States, black and white views of the O.J. Simpson case, racial hoaxes (real or fictional crimes where the crime is falsely imputed to a person of a different race), white crime and how many Americans are undereducated in sociology, specifically race and crime.

In "Media Messages" she shows that the media shapes how we view certain racial groups in American society and the way that different racial groups are portrayed. In the "Skin Game" she discusses some of the current discrimination faced by black Americans. In "History's Strange Fruit" she discusses the criminal law for black slaves and demonstrates that blacks have always been treated more harshly that whites under the American criminal justice system. Further, she mentions racists attacks that blacks suffered by the hands of white Americans and principles she feels are necessary for an equitable criminal justice system. In "Discrimination Or Disparity?" she notes that while blacks do commit a disproportionate share of the crime, they are also discriminated against in the criminal justice system. Further, she notes how many criminologists and sociologists incorrectly argue that there is no or little discrimination by focusing only on certain parts of the criminal processing instead of presenting a holistic view. She notes that even with low levels of discrimination, this can cause damages to individuals, families and communities of color. In "Are We Still Talking About OJ?" she discusses the views of blacks and white of the OJ Simpson trial, why blacks and white held certain opinions about the case, and how the views of other racial groups were excluded. In "Racial Hoaxes", Russell-Brown discusses how whites imputing fictional crimes or crimes they committed themselves to black men, denotes the harm this causes and recommends legislation for this to become a felony. In "White Crime" she notes that although whites commit the majority of the crime and whites are unlikely to be victimized by a black criminal, white Americans still have an irrational fear of being the targets of black crime. Further, she notes that criminologists typically ignore white crime mostly because they themselves are overwhelmingly white and, in the American psyche, crime is associated with blackness. Lastly, in "Race and Crime Literacy" she discusses how Americans are generally undereducated when it comes to sociology and provides a list of individuals, court cases and concepts in order to improve one's knowledge about such issues.

Given the wide range of issues she covers this book feels more like a compilation of chapters than a book with a direct coherent theme. Russell-Brown's analysis is insightful into many of these issues and this was an interesting read. I recommend this.