Customer Reviews

Debating Race: with Michael Eric Dyson

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It's just a sheaf of talking head transcripts, bound into book form. Dyson should have either worked this material into a real book, or posted podcasts of the original video on his website. No excuse for this, as it stands.

Dr. Michael Eric Dyson is a magnificent public intellectual. His thoroughness of thought shows in his debates, and one can learn much from his work. You probably won't agree with all of Dr. Dyson's views, but he does accurately expresses some interesting insights into racial relations in the United States.

Dyson does a great job in dissecting the American mind. He talks about race in a way that forces us to deal with the problem of this country.

While it's true this is a collection of conversations taken over time, it's still a fascinating read. Dyson has to be one of the more vital academics out there and these talks somehow capture his vernacular in way that perhaps wouldn't happen in a traditional book format.

I agree with The Sanity Inspector's review; like too many of Dyson's books (Open Mike, The Michael Eric Dyson Reader, etc) Debating Race is too full of a rebundle of his transcribed talks, in large part, rather than new articles...While I like Mike, this was not one of his better works...

In the first place, I expected this book to be a compilation of ideas, concerns, and experiences from the man himself; not an exchange between scholars. True, there are some very interesting dialogues recorded in this book. Also true is there is much to ponder about. No doubt. But while Mr. Dyson is often an engaging writer (and lest we forget...as if), speaker, I didn't have the patience to get through the conversations in Debating Race. Call me biased, but I would rather get my information from books like these in a one author, one voice format.