A worthy defense of a maligned generation, both passionate and policy-wonkish.
A sharp retort to critics of millennials and the clichés of laziness and narcissism that cling to them.
In her second book, journalist and lawyer Filipovic speaks directly to those who feel stung by the insult “OK, Boomer,” delivered by millennials and GenY-ers weary of smug elders’ lectures about gumption and hard work. Younger generations do work hard, she explains; indeed, they’ve been forced to be always-on and take on multiple gigs in a time when the inequality gap has only widened in the past 50 years. They earn less than boomers did at their age, carry much more student-loan debt, are more likely to delay marriage and children longer for economic reasons, have a harder time buying a home, and feel more socially isolated (“our health is trending in the wrong direction”). The author places much of the blame for this predicament at the feet of boomers, particularly the Reagan-era privatization schemes that economically hamstrung many younger people. In a section on the problem of mass incarceration, the author explores how people of color have been disproportionately affected by the situation. As Filipovic notes, even progressive boomers shouldn’t crow too much: Much of the hard work of the civil rights movement, she notes, was done by people born before the boomers. Ultimately, the book is less of a pile-on than a data dump: If there’s a statistic showing the disparities in wealth and achievement between boomers and millennials, she’s found it. That sometimes gives the prose a dutiful, white-paper feel, a problem alleviated by interviews with people who express their anxieties about work, parenting, climate change, and other topics. By the end, readers will understand that Filipovic seeks to strike a conciliatory tone, asking that boomers avoid tarring younger generations and advocate for the return of the kind of work and family policies that benefitted them.
A worthy defense of a maligned generation, both passionate and policy-wonkish.Pub Date: Aug. 11, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-982153-76-2
Page Count: 208
Publisher: One Signal/Atria
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
A forceful, necessarily provocative call to action for the preservation and protection of American Jewish freedom.
Known for her often contentious perspectives, New York Times opinion writer Weiss battles societal Jewish intolerance through lucid prose and a linear playbook of remedies.
While she was vividly aware of anti-Semitism throughout her life, the reality of the problem hit home when an active shooter stormed a Pittsburgh synagogue where her family regularly met for morning services and where she became a bat mitzvah years earlier. The massacre that ensued there further spurred her outrage and passionate activism. She writes that European Jews face a three-pronged threat in contemporary society, where physical, moral, and political fears of mounting violence are putting their general safety in jeopardy. She believes that Americans live in an era when “the lunatic fringe has gone mainstream” and Jews have been forced to become “a people apart.” With palpable frustration, she adroitly assesses the origins of anti-Semitism and how its prevalence is increasing through more discreet portals such as internet self-radicalization. Furthermore, the erosion of civility and tolerance and the demonization of minorities continue via the “casual racism” of political figures like Donald Trump. Following densely political discourses on Zionism and radical Islam, the author offers a list of bullet-point solutions focused on using behavioral and personal action items—individual accountability, active involvement, building community, loving neighbors, etc.—to help stem the tide of anti-Semitism. Weiss sounds a clarion call to Jewish readers who share her growing angst as well as non-Jewish Americans who wish to arm themselves with the knowledge and intellectual tools to combat marginalization and defuse and disavow trends of dehumanizing behavior. “Call it out,” she writes. “Especially when it’s hard.” At the core of the text is the author’s concern for the health and safety of American citizens, and she encourages anyone “who loves freedom and seeks to protect it” to join with her in vigorous activism.
A forceful, necessarily provocative call to action for the preservation and protection of American Jewish freedom.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-593-13605-8
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 22, 2019
An exquisitely original celebration of American Blackness.
A potent series of “notes” paints a multidimensional picture of Blackness in America.
Throughout the book, which mixes memoir, history, literary theory, and art, Sharpe—the chair of Black studies at York University in Toronto and author of the acclaimed book In the Wake: On Blackness and Being—writes about everything from her family history to the everyday trauma of American racism. Although most of the notes feature the author’s original writing, she also includes materials like photographs, copies of letters she received, responses to a Twitter-based crowdsourcing request, and definitions of terms collected from colleagues and friends (“preliminary entries toward a dictionary of untranslatable blackness”). These diverse pieces coalesce into a multifaceted examination of the ways in which the White gaze distorts Blackness and perpetuates racist violence. Sharpe’s critique is not limited to White individuals, however. She includes, for example, a disappointing encounter with a fellow Black female scholar as well as critical analysis of Barack Obama’s choice to sing “Amazing Grace” at the funeral of the Rev. Clementa Pinckney, who was killed in a hate crime at the Mother Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. With distinct lyricism and a firm but tender tone, Sharpe executes every element of this book flawlessly. Most impressive is the collagelike structure, which seamlessly moves among an extraordinary variety of forms and topics. For example, a photograph of the author’s mother in a Halloween costume transitions easily into an introduction to Roland Barthes’ work Camera Lucida, which then connects just as smoothly to a memory of watching a White visitor struggle with the reality presented by the Legacy Museum in Montgomery, Alabama. “Something about this encounter, something about seeing her struggle…feels appropriate to the weight of this history,” writes the author. It is a testament to Sharpe’s artistry that this incredibly complex text flows so naturally.
An exquisitely original celebration of American Blackness.Pub Date: April 25, 2023
ISBN: 9780374604486
Page Count: 392
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Jan. 18, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2023
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