Erasing Racism: The Survival of the American Nation [Hardcover]

Molefi Kete Asante (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2003

In this profound study of America's persistent racial divide, Molefi Kete Asante, one of our leading scholars of African American history and culture, discusses the festering issue of systemic racism. As Asante makes clear, America continues to be a nation of two people with very different histories and perspectives - a white majority that mainly perceives a land of promise and a black minority very much aware that too many African Americans are still consigned to a ghetto wilderness on the margins of society. Despite the legal and social progress of African Americans since the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s, the bitter legacy of slavery and subsequent racial injustice continues to haunt American society. This is a powerful, deeply perceptive analysis of a crucial social problem by one of America's leading thinkers on race.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In this scathing analysis of the history of racism in America, Asante divides the nation into two camps: a white majority who perceives America as a land of promise, and a black minority that is relegated to exist in a wilderness on the margins of society. Asante, the chair of African-American studies at Temple University and a proponent of Afro-centrism, lays out a non-linear history of racial matters in America, weaving the 17th century arrival of the first indentured African servants with the Los Angeles race riots of 1992 and his own experiences as a black man in America. The key to bridging the racial divide, he argues, lies in getting all Americans to understand and confront the history of slavery. Otherwise, the gap will remain open and the significance of all subsequent racial injustices, from lynchings to police profiling, is lost. Asante can be sketchy in some of his examples of headline-making events involving race (including the 1985 MOVE bombing in Philadelphia, for instance). Whether one agrees with him or not, however, he backs many of his harsh accusations with tough questions, carefully crafted solutions and engaging personal anecdotes. In the end, anyone who has struggled to understand race relations in America or to engage others in open debate about it will glean something valuable from this book.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Asante, a scholar, writer, professor, and sixth-generation American descended from enslaved Africans, has been a guiding light in African American studies. In his latest cogent and animated treatise, he draws on his vast and ready knowledge of American history and contemporary events to assess the grievous damage wrought by racism, methodically and dramatically supporting his statement that "every objective presentation of the political, social, and economic situation of African Americans points to the previous condition of enslavement as a principal reason for our contemporary predicament." Court cases, educational and sociological studies, personal anecdotes, and the writings of a wide range of thinkers, including Malcolm X and Cornel West, all feed the engine of Asante's insightful and soundly reasoned observations about the tangible and psychological realities of life in a world poisoned by racial discrimination. Like bell hooks, Asante not only delineates the tragic legacy of racism but also offers a prescription for healing, in which he astutely and productively addresses the complex question of reparations. "Patriotism," Asante writes, "is, first of all, a national commitment to each other," and for the U.S. to be whole and just, old wrongs must be righted. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 294 pages
• Publisher: Prometheus Books (April 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1591020697
• ISBN-13: 978-1591020691
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,536,780 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Asante Continues to Add Insight to Discussion of Race, October 25, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Erasing Racism: The Survival of the American Nation (Hardcover)

Upon initial exposure of this new Asante tome, i thought it a fresh and long over-due departure from the "Greece borrowed/stole this or that from Afrika" discussion that has engulfed him for more than twenty years. My assumption was correct.

In this book, Asante adds new and pertinent points of perspectives not before considered in debates or discussions dealing with race. He also discusses the very important issue of reparations. This book is a must-have for those interested in courageously addressing the issue of race in the United States and throughout the world.

BNS FOREVER.

Tarikh Bandele

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a must read book!, September 11, 2005

By 

Abdjetu "Mutu" (Paris, France) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Erasing Racism: The Survival of the American Nation (Hardcover)

This is an excellent book. Dr Molefi Kete Asante has written a brillliant book on a very complex issue in the American society and the world: race. How does one erase racism from one's mind? As Pr Asante writes, only by a better knowledge of its past that America can better deal with such a very sensitive and complex problem.
The U.S. likes boasting itself of being a great defender of democracy and justice but it is incapable of defending that same justice and equality for its citizens of African descent. America -and the whole world for that matter- will not be a peaceful place if it doesn't seriously tackle that corny issue: racism. Whether one lives in Paris, London, New-York, Madrid, Brussels, Rome, Beijing, Tokyo or Moscow, to name but a few, racism is always present. We have to erase it if we want to live peacefully with our fellow human beings.
This book by Dr Asante is so well written that I more than recommend it to all the people who put humanity first.
I give it five stars because it more than deserves it!
Go get it!

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Intelligent Argument, February 4, 2005

By 

Shamontiel L. Vaughn "Message from Montie" (Chicago) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Erasing Racism: The Survival of the American Nation (Hardcover)

Although sometimes long-winded and with way too many wild examples for me to handle when it came to brutality (which was precisely his point), I liked this book a lot. I read it for a class, but I would've read it for fun. It goes into the depths of how racism has affected our country as a whole, be it through riots, murder, job prejudice, lack of progress, lack of companionship, lack of trust, poverty, and through celebrities. This author goes into all realms of racism and in the end, proposes the same argument I supported for years. I thoroughly agree with every point he has made, and I like his unique way of spreading about Reparations.
I heard him speak at my college and he was phenomenal. My teacher said he was humble. I don't know where she got that idea from because he was very in-your-face and I love that about him. Any time someone speaks on a controversial topic, they have to be willing to stand by what they say and have relevant examples to back themselves up. One of the ladies in my class said before he spoke that she felt this book "disrespected white people." I totally disagree. I think this book is just the truth that some are not ready to read.