An enlightening history for students of the Black experience and readers of books about books.
A history of Black bookstores as loci of activism, community-building, and education.
Of the “third places” in social life, Black communities have famously formed around barbershops and beauty salons, churches, and civic organizations. Overlooked has been the role of Black-owned bookstores, which, as journalist-turned-author Adams has it, “have always been at the center of the resistance.” Adams begins, in that vein, with David Ruggles, whose Manhattan storefront sold pamphlets and books recounting the evils of slavery and espousing the abolitionist cause—and Ruggles himself, two years after he founded his bookstore in 1834, “had developed a reputation as a charismatic abolitionist who could inspire almost any crowd to action.” Ruggles turned his store into a place where Black people could “gather, read, and learn—all acts that were still largely forbidden in many parts of the country and, therefore, inherently radical.” Not surprisingly, Ruggles’ home soon became a stop on the Underground Railroad, helping some 300 enslaved people to escape to freedom—one of them, significantly, Frederick Douglass. Adams’ next subject is a young man named Lewis Michaux, who sold books from a cart before opening his National Memorial African Book Store in Harlem in 1933. It became a pioneering center for the early Black Nationalist movement. Taking her story into the militant era of the 1960s and ’70s, Adams profiles bookstore owners such as Charlie Cobb, whose Drum and Spear bookshop was a gathering point for activists in Washington, and who, among other things, paid special attention to books for young readers, an impetus for many other bookstores of that time and to this day. Black-owned bookstores—Adams reckons there are about 130 today—face challenges ranging from gentrification and discriminatory financing to competition from online vendors. But, Adams writes, this reflects the Black American condition in general, “pushing through adversity, holding on to values, and bending without breaking.”
An enlightening history for students of the Black experience and readers of books about books.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593474235
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Tiny Reparations
Review Posted Online: Sept. 24, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2025
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
IN THE NEWS
IN THE NEWS
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.
A helpful guide to working effectively with people from other cultures.
“The sad truth is that the vast majority of managers who conduct business internationally have little understanding about how culture is impacting their work,” writes Meyer, a professor at INSEAD, an international business school. Yet they face a wider array of work styles than ever before in dealing with clients, suppliers and colleagues from around the world. When is it best to speak or stay quiet? What is the role of the leader in the room? When working with foreign business people, failing to take cultural differences into account can lead to frustration, misunderstanding or worse. Based on research and her experiences teaching cross-cultural behaviors to executive students, the author examines a handful of key areas. Among others, they include communicating (Anglo-Saxons are explicit; Asians communicate implicitly, requiring listeners to read between the lines), developing a sense of trust (Brazilians do it over long lunches), and decision-making (Germans rely on consensus, Americans on one decider). In each area, the author provides a “culture map scale” that positions behaviors in more than 20 countries along a continuum, allowing readers to anticipate the preferences of individuals from a particular country: Do they like direct or indirect negative feedback? Are they rigid or flexible regarding deadlines? Do they favor verbal or written commitments? And so on. Meyer discusses managers who have faced perplexing situations, such as knowledgeable team members who fail to speak up in meetings or Indians who offer a puzzling half-shake, half-nod of the head. Cultural differences—not personality quirks—are the motivating factors behind many behavioral styles. Depending on our cultures, we understand the world in a particular way, find certain arguments persuasive or lacking merit, and consider some ways of making decisions or measuring time natural and others quite strange.
These are not hard and fast rules, but Meyer delivers important reading for those engaged in international business.Pub Date: May 27, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-61039-250-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2014
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