What Truth Sounds Like: Robert F. Kennedy, James Baldwin, and Our Unfinished Conversation About Race in America
Jun 2018 · St. Martin's Press
3.9star
8 reviewsreport
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288
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About this ebook
A Pivotal Encounter That Transformed Race Relations in America
Named a 2018 Notable Work of Nonfiction by The Washington Post
NOW A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Winner, The 2018 Southern Book Prize
In 1963, a meeting between Attorney General Robert Kennedy and black luminaries James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, Kenneth Clark, and Jerome Smith forever altered the course of the civil rights movement. Smith's unfiltered fury at the nation's racist tendencies left Kennedy deeply shaken, prompting him to empathize with the black experience and catalyzing a shift in his policies.
What Truth Sounds Like explores this pivotal encounter and the conflicts it laid bare – between conscience and politics, morality and power – in addressing race. Every major argument about race that persists today, from dissent and patriotism to the responsibility of black leaders in effecting change, was heard in that room.
Bestselling author Michael Eric Dyson masterfully refracts our present racial divisions through the prism of this historic meeting. A tour de force of searing prose and seminal brilliance, the book offers a compelling look at the intersections of race, democracy, and the ongoing struggle for social justice.
Hailed as "a work of searing prose and seminal brilliance" by Joy-Ann Reid and "a beautifully written book" by Chris Matthews, What Truth Sounds Like is a must-read for anyone grappling with the state of race relations in America today.
Named a 2018 Notable Work of Nonfiction by The Washington Post
NOW A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Winner, The 2018 Southern Book Prize
In 1963, a meeting between Attorney General Robert Kennedy and black luminaries James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, Kenneth Clark, and Jerome Smith forever altered the course of the civil rights movement. Smith's unfiltered fury at the nation's racist tendencies left Kennedy deeply shaken, prompting him to empathize with the black experience and catalyzing a shift in his policies.
What Truth Sounds Like explores this pivotal encounter and the conflicts it laid bare – between conscience and politics, morality and power – in addressing race. Every major argument about race that persists today, from dissent and patriotism to the responsibility of black leaders in effecting change, was heard in that room.
Bestselling author Michael Eric Dyson masterfully refracts our present racial divisions through the prism of this historic meeting. A tour de force of searing prose and seminal brilliance, the book offers a compelling look at the intersections of race, democracy, and the ongoing struggle for social justice.
Hailed as "a work of searing prose and seminal brilliance" by Joy-Ann Reid and "a beautifully written book" by Chris Matthews, What Truth Sounds Like is a must-read for anyone grappling with the state of race relations in America today.
Ratings and reviews
3.9
8 reviews
Jason Scoggins
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August 4, 2018
Thought provoking contemporary insight to how exposure can help extinguish
ignorance. Thank you for the contribution Dr. Dyson
4 people found this review helpful
About the author
MICHAEL ERIC DYSON is one of America’s premier public intellectuals and the author of the New York Times bestseller Tears We Cannot Stop. He occupies the distinguished position of University Professor of Sociology at Georgetown University, is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, and is a contributing editor of The New Republic and ESPN’s The Undefeated. Ebony magazine named him one of the 100 Most Influential African Americans and one of the 150 most powerful blacks in the nation.
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