Hello {{ first name | friends}},
Can you believe it's the last reading list of 2024. By my count, this will be 53 in the series, which means I've curated somewhere in excess of 550 articles (some of the editions have more than 10 articles). It's been quite a year - here's a holiday reading list to take you into the new year.
White supremacist ideology kills and not just at gunpoint. The slow erosion of mental health because of the stress of xenophobia, racism, anti-Blackness and systems and structures that often fail those who most need them is a more insidious murderer. (Yes, I said it!) Here, Christian Ortiz lays it out:
“Racialized violence has been a defining feature of white supremacy, from the lynchings of Black individuals during Jim Crow to modern-day mass shootings targeting Black and Brown populations. This violence is not simply a matter of individual hatred—it’s a systemic and cultural phenomenon deeply rooted in the psychological effects of white supremacy on white communities.”
2. Black Women Have Been Marching Since Selma, We’re Waiting The Next One Out by Rebecca Stevens Alder
I consider Rebecca Stevens Alder one of my sisters in anti-racism writing. We appeared on Medium at the same time and have continued to bring to light what we need to talk about. Her articles are personal, direct and impactful, and this one recognises how many Black women are feeling after the unsurprising results of the 2024 US election. (You'll need a free trial membership to read this one.)
“Black women lead, organize, mobilize, march, and are systematically short-changed. It’s like domestic abuse - we march, we are abused, and we come back again. It all has to stop at one point, so “No,” we won’t be there in January 2025 in Washington, DC. Don’t count on it; figure it out yourselves.”
3. How the Normalization of Modern Anti-Immigrant Sentiments Unfolded by Arturo Dominguez
I like Arturo's work because I get a perspective I'm not getting in many other places, from a lens that's outside my own experience. This article looks at the history and current practice in relation to anti-immigration, with specific reference to what's happening in Latine communities.
“History tells us that the U.S. government, with the help of legacy media, has often created programs to prevent coalition building among disenfranchised and marginalized groups. We’ve seen racism injected into feminist and LGBTQ movements alongside the normalization of racist language and misinformation that is often used against other nonwhite groups as well. We are also witnessing homophobic and transphobic ideas inserted into various nonwhite communities.”
If you felt a visceral reaction on seeing the orange one's name, don't worry; I felt it too. But we can't let that feeling stop us from paying attention to what's happening. Shari Dunn shows just how bad things could get.
“Trump’s presidency appears poised to roll back workplace protections for Black Americans to a degree not seen since the end of Reconstruction, which ushered in Jim Crow. For Black professionals, who already navigate systemic barriers and entrenched inequities, this represents a direct assault on their workplace opportunities and dignity.”
5. Scholars Thought White Women Were Passive Enslavers. They Were Wrong. by Rachel L. Swarns
Well, this isn't a surprise, but there's compelling evidence in this NYT article. If you can't read it, there's a portion of it here.
“Dr. Jones-Rogers believes the research also helps to explain why many white Southern women romanticized slavery and supported the system of racial segregation that emerged after the Civil War, a system that helped ensure that their families could continue to benefit from a plentiful supply of low-cost Black labor.”
6. It’s Not Them. It’s You by Clay Rivers
Here, Clay Rivers offers an alternative to the "not-enoughness" often caused by being targeted by racism, and it's less hopeless than this quote makes it seem:
“You’ll never meet their expectations, nor will you be free of their preconceptions. No one will. You’ll never have all the answers to set everything right in their world. You’ll never be enough. We set ourselves up for disappointment when we approach relationships with unrealistic goals, ill-conceived misconceptions, and myopic expectations.”
7. White Women and Reactionary Politics by Denise Lynn
Yep, still not surprised. This article charts some history and looks ahead to what can be done.
“We can express our disappointment, but we also need to abandon shock that white women once again voted against progressive interests. Instead of revisiting the same jarring realization over and over, it is important to think about how to organize white women for progressive goals."
8. 'My daughter suffered same racism in school I did' by David Humphreys
We often like to think that things are getting better, and some things are, sometimes, for some of the people, but there are still far too many Global Majority people experiencing what the woman cited in this article describes:
“"I was often shouted at by other children to go back to where I came from and this taught me to stay away from those with those kinds of beliefs. "Now, fast forward 36 years, sadly my daughter also experienced racism in her school.”
9. Making filmmaking more inclusive by The Runnymede Trust
I enjoyed this interview with the founders of Other Cinemas who are intentional about providing a platform for Global Majority filmmakers:
“I think the biggest issue around representation is that it’s often seen as this numerical thing – that there are not enough Black and non-white bodies in an industry. But the problem is more about the lack of representation when it comes to our ideas. You might have many Black or Asian directors right now, but we’re not allowed to tell our stories in the authentic and uninhibited way that we want to.”
10. Nigerians migrate to the UK and US in search of the good life – but this isn’t what they find by Tunde A. Alabi
I've included this article as part of my mission to diversify the perspectives featured - and it seems that when it comes to immigration to the US and UK, the report card is somewhat mixed:
“I do not, in any way, discourage migration. But it’s important for intending migrants to be aware of what life could really be like in the countries they’re going to.”
Well, that's it for this month, and for 2024. The "Of Note" section will be back in January 2025. See you then!
In the meantime, be sure to drop a comment and let me know which article resonated most with you this month.
Thanks for reading,
Sharon
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*Note: all articles linked here were free to read when I put together this edition. However, some may be paywalled by the time it is published, because capitalism. There’s not much I can do about that, but I hope the included quotes give you a flavour of the content.
© Sharon Hurley Hall, 2024. All Rights Reserved.
I am an anti-racism educator and activist, the author of “I’m Tired of Racism”, and co-host of The Introvert Sisters podcast. This newsletter is published on beehiiv (affiliate link).