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Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life Paperback – March 4, 2014

by Karen E. Fields (Author), Barbara J. Fields (Author)

35 customer reviews

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Most people assume that racism grows from a perception of human difference: the fact of race gives rise to the practice of racism. Sociologist Karen E. Fields and historian Barbara J. Fields argue otherwise: the practice of racism produces the illusion of race, through what they call "racecraft." And this phenomenon is intimately entwined with other forms of inequality in American life. So pervasive are the devices of racecraft in American history, economic doctrine, politics, and everyday thinking that the presence of racecraft itself goes unnoticed.

That the promised post-racial age has not dawned, the authors argue, reflects the failure of Americans to develop a legitimate language for thinking about and discussing inequality. That failure should worry everyone who cares about democratic institutions.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

“It’s not just a challenge to racists, it’s a challenge to people like me, it’s a challenge to African-Americans who have accepted the fact of race and define themselves by the concept of race.”
—Ta-Nehisi Coates

“Demanding and intelligent.”
—Jennifer Vega, PopMatters

“These essays are extraordinary. I love the forceful elegance with which they hammer home that race is a monstrous fiction, racism is a monstrous crime.”
—Junot Díaz

Karen E. Fields and Barbara J. Fields have undertaken a great untangling of how
the chimerical concepts of race are pervasively and continuously reinvented and
reemployed in this country.”
—Maria Bustillos, Los Angeles Review of Books

“The neologism ‘racecraft’ is modelled on ‘witchcraft’ … It isn’t that the Fieldses
regard the commitment to race as a category as an irrational superstition. On the
contrary, they are interested precisely in exploring its rationality—the role that
beliefs about race play in structuring American society—while at the same time
reminding us that those beliefs may be rational but they’re not true.”
—Walter Benn Michaels, London Review of Books

“A most impressive work, tackling a demanding and important topic—the myth that we now live in a postracial society—in a novel, urgent, and compelling way. The authors dispel this myth by squarely addressing the paradox that racism is scientifically discredited but, like witchcraft before it, retains a social rationale in societies that remain highly unequal and averse to sufficiently critical engagement with their own history and traditions.”
—Robin Blackburn

“[Racecraft] should be more widely read than it is—no matter its current reach. In it, the authors achieve an intelligence and agility that is rare in discussions of identity, racism, and inequality.”
—Matthew McKnight, Nation

“Liberal mores against overt racism are crumbling in the face of Trump. We must build them better … The Fields sisters dive through sociology, history, and science to reach the material truth: races is a product of racism, not the other way around.”
—Charlie Heller, Paste

“With examples ranging from the profound to the absurd—including, for instance, an imaginary interview with W E B Dubois and Emile Durkheim, as well as personal porch chats with the authors’ grandmother—the Fields delve into “racecraft’s” profound effect on American political, social and economic life.”
—Global Journal

“This is a very thoughtful book, a very urgent book.”
—The Academic & The Artist Cloudcast

About the Author

Barbara J. Fields is Professor of History at Columbia University, author of Slavery and Freedom on the Middle Ground: Maryland During the Nineteenth Century and coauthor of Free at Last: A Documentary History of Slavery, Freedom, and the Civil War.

Karen E. Fields, an independent scholar, holds degrees from Harvard University, Brandeis University, and the Sorbonne. She is the author of many articles and three published books: Revival and Rebellion in Colonial Central Africa, about millennarianism; Lemon Swamp and Other Places: A Carolina Memoir (with Mamie Garvin Fields), about life in the twentieth-century South; and a retranslation of Emile Durkheim's masterpiece, The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. She has two works in progress: Bordeaux's Africa, about the view of slavery from a European port city, and Race Matters in the American Academy.

Product details

Paperback: 310 pages
Publisher: Verso; Reprint edition (March 4, 2014)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1781683131
ISBN-13: 978-1781683132
Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 0.9 x 8.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 35 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #28,648 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #53 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Politics & Government > Ideologies & Doctrines > Democracy
- #141 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Anthropology > Cultural
- #173 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Sociology > Race Relations > Discrimination & Racism

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Racecraft: Well crafted

January 4, 2013

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

I'm a pretty big fan of this book. Racecraft has two central arguments. The first argument is that race and understandings of race operate in very similar ways to witchcraft. Meaning that race is used to explain different societal problems and historical events because it seems like a commonsense explanation. Second, the authors argue that race is often used as a stand-in for racism, which is at best a distraction, and at worst, a continuation of systemic racism. Both of these arguments and the "rhetoric" of racism are engaging topics and the authors do a great job of running their arguments through a variety of situations to support their argument. I can easily recommend this book, but suggest that readers take a look at the different chapter titles and read the ones that seem most interesting. The book is a series of new and revised articles, which can be both repetitive and, at times, disjointed. After reading the most interesting parts, it might be a good idea to go back and read skipped sections for additional nuggets of wisdom.

43 people found this helpful

I'll never look at race the same way again

September 5, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Race and racism are two things which have had immeasurable influence in American history, yet we often take them for granted as acceptable social reality. The major insight here, which goes beyond the elementary "race as social construction," is that far from being irrational, the concept of race stems from the ways in which society sees itself as compared to others. It isn't limited to inborn differences, but also extends to invisible qualities, what we usually call stereotypes. The book is composed of several essays, written in different contexts, but united in theme. This includes a complete dismantling of traditional scientific bases for race, the complexities of Jim Crow, and an imagined conversation between Emile Durkheim and W. E. B. DuBois. Where it all comes together, as with many books, is the conclusion, which goes into how racecraft masks and diverts our attention from an inequality that is burned into American society. In this respect, it shares much with Ian Lopez's DOG WHISTLE POLITICS. With such a wide range of thought and approach, this book deserves to be widely read in order to change hearts and minds.

2 people found this helpful

Amazon Customer

Well-researched and radically enlightening...

February 10, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Does skin color or our own moral deficiencies cause racism? The fabulous Fields sisters make a compelling argument that unless we begin to look at racism as a product of immoral behavior and not a direct product of skin color, we may never move past this plague.

8 people found this helpful

Steven J. Heikkila

Every American should read this.

February 21, 2018

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Every person in America should read this. Karen and Barbara Fields do a great job of trying to disabuse us (those on the left as much as on the right) to abandon our fascination with race in a manner that doesn't just "pretend" we live in a colorblind, post-racial society. Race is a totall debunked pseudo-scientific concept. Using an analogy with witchcraft (e.g., there are no such thing as witches, but as a social phenomenon, witchcraft was nevertheless "real" in the sense that there are concrete practices and behaviors around it). In this sense, then, race is a fiction, but racism is very much real. The concept of racecraft shifts focus from race as a kind of ontology, to racism as a kind of practice. Or as they put it, racecraft focuses attention from who African Americas are, to what racists do. Race is a product of racism, not vice versa. It's amazing, important work.

Teresa Camajani

I have long loved their work

October 24, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Oh my! The intellect, the deep understanding and ability to transmit that understanding to the reader! The Fields's (is that even a word?) bring such intellectual and academic gifts to this work and lay bare the establishment and growth of RACE in American history. I have long loved their work, and this book shows why!

One person found this helpful

A Must Read about Race in the USA

May 25, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

The book confirms for me what I have long suspected. It is succinct, clear and thought-provoking. It shreds the ideology that says "We are not racist" rather well. Red it, share it with others, send it as a gift, give your public library a copy, etc. You know.

One person found this helpful

Amazon Customer

An important work. I found the argument a bit ...

March 4, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

An important work. I found the argument a bit repetitive the framework of the discussion valuable. The writing style is largely conceptual and punctuated with personal stories from the author including hypothetical interactions among historical figures. It seemed light on detail. All in all a worthy contribution to the understanding of racism

2 people found this helpful

Kindle Customer

Fine. Interesting. Sometimes lush. Not profound.

December 14, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Some great writing especially the chapter on memory. Some turgid writing too. A mixed bag, useful in deconstructing the concept of race but hardly original.

One person found this helpful

Most recent customer reviews

A very necessary education

This book has made me rethink so many things. It has also made me sad.

Published 3 months ago

Just one of those books that people should read and talk about.

Published 3 months ago

Read thoroughly and intentionally

This book should be required 📚 in every high school literature, social studies, and history course.Read more

Published 4 months ago

Amazon Customer

The most amazing book on race and inequality

For folk interested in the relationship between race and racism, and who want to explain that relationship without reifying race, this book provides you with an appropriate...Read more

Published 4 months ago

Important book, thoughtful and informed

Published 5 months ago

a book deserving to be read by every adult in the US.

Published 7 months ago

What was constructed must be laboriously deconstructed!

An absolutely indispensable contribution to race studies in the U.S., it makes the strong case that race itself is asking to the belief in witchcraft.Read more

Published 11 months ago

An eye-opening and mind-expanding examination of how and why race was constructed. What purpose does it serve?Read more

Published 11 months ago

Published 1 year ago

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