On this 4th of July, we offer a reading list that explores three main topics: Settler Colonialism, Colonialism, and U.S. Imperialism.
We cannot seek to dismantle white supremacy without understanding the true histories of how this land was stolen and also seek to know the stories of people outside of the U.S. whose histories and destinies continue to be shaped by U.S. colonial and imperial policies and projects. The U.S. was founded by a practice of what is now known as "Settler Colonialism." White people came to this land and killed or removed the Native people and sought to completely eradicate their surviving culture. White people enslaved people from Africa and used their bodies and their unpaid labor to build a nation while also seeking to eradicate their surviving culture. Throughout the 18th, 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, the U.S. waged official and covert wars of colonization and territory expansion, as well as economic imperialism throughout the globe--from Mexico to Puerto Rico to the Philippines to Hawaii to Alaska, American Samoa, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Haiti, The Dominican Republic, The Virgin Islands, Guam, The Northern Mariana Islands, South Korea, Cuba, Grenada, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, the Congo, Palestine, Somalia,Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Libya, and likely more that are not yet known to our history books. Some of these wars have been fought transparently in the name of U.S. expansion and prosperity, many more have been cloaked in the false flag of humanitarianism, the fight against Communism, the fight against terrorism. U.S. policies continue to force human migration throughout the world. When people migrate to the U.S. hoping for safety we regularly commit additional harms against them and seek to separate them from "true Americans."
Most of us know some of these truths, yet many of us, especially those of us who are white, act as though we don't. Because to act as though we understand our history and our nation's global and domestic policies would necessitate a deep thoughtfulness about what, exactly, it is we are celebrating on Independence Day. We believe that the Fourth of July represents an opportunity for pause and reflection, a day of mourning, not of celebration.
By listening to and learning from the human stories that make up our collective history, we can practice rejecting the lie of American exceptionalism and superiority and begin acting in ways that align with our desire to dismantle white supremacy wherever it manifests. We offer this list in the spirit of building a common memory so that we might yet build a truly common future.
An intersectional history of the shared struggle for African American and Latinx civil rights
Winner: Native American and Indigenous Studies Association's Best Subsequent Book 2017
Honorable Mention: Labriola Center American Indian National Book Award 2017
Across North America, Indigenous acts of resistance have in recent years opposed the removal of federal protections for forests and waterways in Indigenous lands, halted the expansion of tar san
Chronicles how American culture - deeply rooted in white supremacy, slavery and capitalism - finds its origin story in the 17th century European colonization of Africa and North America, exposing the structural origins of American looting
Many people first encounter Hawai'i through the imagination--a postcard picture of hula girls, lu'aus, and plenty of sun, surf, and sea. While Hawai'i is indeed beautiful, Native Hawaiians struggle with the problems brought about by colonialism, military occupation, tourism, food insecurity, high costs of living, and climate change.
C saire's essay stands as an important document in the development of
third world consciousness--a process in which he] played a prominent
role.
A crucial, clear-eyed accounting of Puerto Rico's 122 years as a colony of the US.
This classic book is the first truly comprehensive history of American imperialism.
The classic work of political, economic, and historical analysis, powerfully introduced by Angela Davis
In this revised and expanded edition of Medicine Stories, Aurora Levins Morales weaves together insights and lessons learned over a lifetime of activism to offer a new theory of social justice.
Adapted from the bestselling grassroots history of the United States, the story of America in the world, told in comics form
A passionately urgent call for all of us to unlearn imperialism and repair the violent world we share, from one of our most compelling political theorists
In this theoretical tour-de-force, renowned scholar Ariella Aïsha Azoulay calls on us to recognize the imperial foundations of knowledge and to refuse its strictures and its many violences.
Email or call for price.
First published in 1961, Frantz Fanon's The Wretched of the Earth is a masterful and timeless interrogation of race, colonialism, psychological trauma, and revolutionary struggle. In 2020, it found a new readership in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests and the centering of narratives interrogating race by Black writers.
Few modern voices have had as profound an impact on the black identity and critical race theory as Frantz Fanon, and Black Skin, White Masks represents some of his most important work. Fanon's masterwork is now available in a new translation that updates its language for a new generation of readers.
A damning exploration of the many ways in which the effects and logic of anti-black colonialism continue to inform our modern world.
Set during the first two decades of Israeli statehood when Palestinians who managed to remain after 1948 lived under a repressive military regime, Citizen Strangers examines how Arabs and Jews navigated the opposing impulses of exclusion and inclusion in a new state forced by new international norms to grant citizenship and suffrage rights to its unwanted native minority.
Kris Manjapra weaves together the study of colonialism over the past 500 years, across the globe's continents and seas.
Millions of Africans, Asians, and other peoples were the subjects of colonial rule by overseas empires through the mid-twentieth century. By the end of the century, however, nearly all of these peoples had become citizens of independent nation-states. The United Nations grew from 51 member states at its founding in 1945 to 193 today.
Email or call for price.
Often perceived as unbridgeable, the boundaries that divide humanity from itself--whether national, gender, racial, political, or imperial--are rearticulated through friendship. Elora Halim Chowdhury and Liz Philipose edit a collection of essays that express the different ways women forge hospitality in deference to or defiance of the structures meant to keep them apart.
Email or call for price.
Exceptional State analyzes the nexus of culture and contemporary manifestations of U.S. imperialism. The contributors, established and emerging cultural studies scholars, define culture broadly to include a range of media, literature, and political discourse. They do not posit September 11, 2001 as the beginning of U.S.
Women across the globe are being dramatically affected by war as currently waged by the USA.
Feminist Geneaologies, Colonial Legacies, Democratic Futures provides a feminist anaylsis of the questions of sexual and gender politics, economic and cultural marginality, and anti-racist and anti-colonial practices both in the "West" and in the "Third World." This collection, edited by Jacqui Alexander and Chan
Recognizing an urgent need for Indigenous liberation strategies, Indigenous intellectuals met to create a book with hands-on suggestions and activities to enable Indigenous communities to decolonize themselves.
For Indigenous Minds Only features Indigenous scholars, writers, and activists who have collaborated for the creation of a sequel to For Indigenous Eyes Only (SAR Press, 2005).
Named one of the ten best books of the year by the Chicago Tribune
A Publishers Weekly best book of 2019 | A 2019 NPR Staff Pick
A pathbreaking history of the United States’ overseas possessions and the true meaning of its empire
Email or call for price.
Winner of the British Academy’s Nayef Al-Rodhan Prize for Global Cultural Understanding 2020
Highly commended for PEN Hessell–Tiltman Prize 2020
A haunting and evocative history of British empire, told through one woman’s family story
This collection of works by prominent Latin Americanists explores the region's move beyond the neoliberal era.
Originally published in Mexico in 1970, Indigenous and Popular Thinking in Am rica is the first book by the Argentine philosopher Rodolfo Kusch (1922-79) to be translated into English.
"An enthralling story . . . A work of history that reads like a novel." — Christian Science Monitor
“As Hochschild’s brilliant book demonstrates, the great Congo scandal prefigured our own times . . .
Melancholia Africana argues that in the African and Afro-diasporic context, melancholy is rooted in collective experiences such as slavery, colonization, and the post-colony.
Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History
A New York Times Notable Book
A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice Selection
A Providence Journal Best Book of the Year
Winner of the Organization of American Historians Merle Curti Award for Social History
Finalist for the Harriet Tubman Prize
Tracing five centuries of exploitation in Latin America, a classic in the field, now in its twenty fifth year
The contributors to Otherwise Worlds investigate the complex relationships between settler colonialism and anti-Blackness to explore the political possibilities that emerge from such inquiries.
M. Jacqui Alexander is one of the most important theorists of transnational feminism working today. Pedagogies of Crossing brings together essays she has written over the past decade, uniting her incisive critiques, which have had such a profound impact on feminist, queer, and critical race theories, with some of her more recent work.
Settlers: The Mythology of the White Proletariat from Mayflower to Modern (Kersplebedeb) (Paperback)
A uniquely important book in the canon of the North American revolutionary left and anticolonial movements, Settlers was first published in the 1980s.
The first in-depth analysis of the radical feminist theory and coalitional praxis of scholar-activist Mar a Lugones.
The Jamaican writer and cultural theorist Sylvia Wynter is best known for her diverse writings that pull together insights from theories in history, literature, science, and black studies, to explore race, the legacy of colonialism, and representations of humanness.
This powerful and impassioned history of the Haitian Revolution of 1791–1803 is the classic account of the largest successful revolt by enslaved people in history.
“One of the seminal texts about the history of slavery and abolition. . . . Provocative and empowering.” –The New York Times Book Review
Email or call for price.
For hundreds of years, the history of the conquest of Mexico and the defeat of the Aztecs has been told in the words of the Spanish victors. Miguel León-Portilla has long been at the forefront of expanding that history to include the voices of indigenous peoples.
Illuminates how the preservation of slavery was a motivating factor for the Revolutionary War
Acclaimed historian Gerald Horne troubles America's settler colonialism's creation myth
Email or call for price.
"The Decolonial Imaginary is a smart, challenging book that disrupts a great deal of what we think we know . . . it will certainly be read seriously in Chicano/a studies." --Women's Review of Books
Winner of an English PEN Award 2021!
"A feminist narrative of how decolonization is a never-ending struggle!"—Veronica Gago, co-author of A Feminist Reading of Debt
For too long feminism has been co-opted by the forces they seek to dismantle.
A landmark history of one hundred years of war waged against the Palestinians from the foremost US historian of the Middle East, told through pivotal events and family history
The renowned literary and cultural critic Edward Said was one of our era’s most provocative and important thinkers. This comprehensive collection of his work, expanded from the earlier Edward Said Reader, now draws from across his entire four-decade career, including his posthumously published books, making it a definitive one-volume source.
"Harsha Walia has played a central role in building some of North America's most innovative, diverse, and effective new movements. That this brilliant organizer and theorist has found time to share her wisdom in this book is a tremendous gift to us all."--Naomi Klein, author of The Shock Doctrine
An urgent, global account of the migration crisis and the function of borders across political, social, cultural, and economic systems.
Email or call for price.
Drawing on interviews with 51 anti-authoritarian organizers to investigates what it means to struggle for "the commons" within a settler colonial context, Unsettling the Commons interrogates a very important debatethat took place within Occupy camps and is taking place in a multitude of movements in North America around what it means to claim "the commons" on stolen land.
The powerful, untold story of the 1950 revolution in Puerto Rico and the long history of U.S. intervention on the island, that the New York Times says "could not be more timely." In 1950, after over fifty years of military occupation and colonial rule, the Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico staged an unsuccessful armed insurrection against the United States.
Email or call for price.
" Western Women and Imperialism] provides fascinating insights into interactions and attitudes between western and non-western women, mainly in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
New York Times Bestseller
Now part of the HBO docuseries "Exterminate All the Brutes," written and directed by Raoul Peck
Recipient of the American Book Award
The first history of the United States told from the perspective of indigenous peoples
Ronald Takaki's beloved classic is a "brilliant revisionist history of America" (Publishers Weekly) that dramatically retells our nation's story from the perspective of minorities.
Upon its first publication, A Different Mirror was hailed by critics and academics everywhere as a dramatic new retelling of our nation's past.