Dear friends,
As book lovers, in times of heartbreak, we are naturally drawn to passionate words and fiery beauty to inspire comfort or inform our next steps. The Zimmerman verdict and the entirety of the trial has left so many of us in the community alternating between a grief-stricken quiet and a rage that is still finding its full shape and eloquence.
This is a hard place to be: to be a justice loving person who sees the world is broken and doesn’t yet know the next steps toward building a more whole future. Many of you came to Charis this week for a quiet place to sit and talk with people who wouldn’t argue with you. Many of you came to Zahra's community yoga class on Sunday morning for somatic healing; some of you went on a medicinal weed walk around Little 5 Points in the rare break of sunshine. Many of you stopped in on your way to march in the West End. I am very grateful for all of you who are investing in Charis as a community gathering place that can hold your pain, your confusion, your devastating sadness, if only for a moment.
As community members look around the room and ask what next, we are very aware that what’s next must always be more complexity, not less, more multiplicity, fewer easy answers, more hard conversations, more information. Many of you are asking us what you should be reading these days to help you get through the day, change your community, and change the world. We think the answer is two-fold. We hold up and celebrate the amazing real-time feminist and social-justice writing happening online which is able to be immediately responsive to on the ground situations and movement building. We know you already have your favorites, but we are especially grateful for the work of the writers at the Crunk Feminist Collective and believe that they are creating online feminist community in invaluable ways. We also believe there remains a true need for books in times of crisis and heartbreak. The different timescale of a book allows you to sink in and be healed by a different kind of medicine. To that end we have compiled a short list of books that we are looking to for guidance, support, comfort, and challenge this week. These are not all perfect books; nor is this list exhaustive. It is only meant perhaps to touch a place in you that needs a conversation with the page right now in addition to the other conversations you are having.
What are you reading? What do you recommend? Tweet us @chariscircle or post it to our Facebook wall at Facebook/CharisBooks. We would love to know the books that are giving you life right now.
Presenting the essential writings of black lesbian poet and feminist writer Audre Lorde, Sister Outsider celebrates an influential voice in twentieth-century literature.
“[Lorde's] works will be important to those truly interested in growing up sensitive, intelligent, and aware.”—The New York Times
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The book that galvanized the nation, gave voice to the emerging civil rights movementin the 1960s—and still lights the way to understanding race in America today. • "The finest essay I’ve ever read.” —Ta-Nehisi Coates
This beloved bestseller—over 180,000 copies sold—has helped caregivers worldwide keep themselves emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, and physically healthy in the face of the sometimes overwhelming traumas they confront every day.
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The beautiful practicality of her teaching has made Pema Chodron one of the most beloved of contemporary American spiritual authors among Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike. A collection of talks she gave between 1987 and 1994, the book is a treasury of wisdom for going on living when we are overcome by pain and difficulties. Chodron discusses:
A volume in Educational Leadership for Social Justice Series Editor Jeffrey S. Brooks, University of Missouri-Columbia, Denise E. Armstrong, Brock University; Ira Bogotch, Florida Atlantic University; Sandra Harris, Lamar University; Whitney H.
At one time a wild young girl and a brilliant artist, Ava Delaney changes dramatically after a violent event that rocks her entire family. Once loved and respected in their community and in their church, they are ostracized by their neighbors, led by their church leader, and a seventeen-year feud between the Delaneys and the church ensues.
From one of our most important scholars and civil rights activist icon, a powerful study of the women’s liberation movement and the tangled knot of oppression facing Black women.
“Angela Davis is herself a woman of undeniable courage. She should be heard.”—The New York Times
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Known for its lively, clear prose as well as its scholarly research, A People's History of the United States is the only volume to tell America's story from the point of view of -- and in the words of -- America's women, factory workers, African-Americans, Native Americans, working poor, and immigrant laborers.This P.S.
The Prisoner's Wife is a beautiful story about love that overcomes every obstacle and thrives against all odds.
“A powerful and provocative book—everyone should read it.” —Angela Y.
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What are the conditions needed for our nation to bridge cultural and racial divides? By "writing beyond race," noted cultural critic bell hooks models the constructive ways scholars, activists, and readers can challenge and change systems of domination.
Killing the Black Body remains a rallying cry for education, awareness, and action on extending reproductive justice to all women. It is as crucial as ever, even two decades after its original publication.
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In Medicating Race, Anne Pollock traces the intersecting discourses of race, pharmaceuticals, and heart disease in the United States over the past century, from the founding of cardiology through the FDA's approval of BiDil, the first drug sanctioned for use in a specific race.
An identification of the problems of divided neighborhoods and nine tools that can mend them What if divided neighborhoods were causing public health problems? What if a new approach to planning and design could tackle both the built environment and collective well-being at the same time? What if cities could help each other? Dr.
Nautilus Book Award Gold Winner
A psychotherapist offers “crucial” guidance on how to “alter fundamentally our fearful relationship to deep feelings,” from depression and anxiety to grief and fear (Los Angeles Times)
A compendium of writings that detail the grassroots actions of social and political activists from the civil rights era of the early 1960s to the present day, this book reviews the major points of intersection between white supremacy and the war machine through historic and contemporary articles from a diverse range of scholars and activists.
Organized into four sections, this collection of essays is geared toward activists engaging with the dynamic questions of how to create and support effective movements for visionary systemic change. These essays and interviews present powerful lessons for transformative organizing.
This gorgeous collection gathers Alice Walker's wide-ranging meditations--many of them previously unpublished--on our intertwined personal, spiritual, and political destinies.
"Do not underestimate the power of the book you are holding in your hands."
--Michelle Alexander
In the 1960s he exhorted students at Columbia University to burn their college to the ground. Today he’s chair of their School of the Arts film division.