White Readers Meet Black Authors: Review of The New Jim Crow

Novelist and blogger Carleen Brice recently published Cheri Paris Edwards' review of the book, The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander's eye-opening book on the impact of America's prison industrial complex on poor Black and Brown populations in America. An excerpt of the post published on Brice's popular blog, White Readers Meet Black Authors, is published below. A link to the full review follows the post.

"If you're a regular visitor to this blog, you know I don't often cover nonfiction. Nothing against nonfiction (I've written some myself). Just trying to maintain some focus. However, occasionally a book grabs my attention. The New Press sent me a copy of The New Jim Crow, which is definitely worthy of any attention I can help bring to it. Before I could read this NAACP image award winner, I noticed novelist Cheri Paris Edwards mention on Facebook that she was planning to read it. Kismet. I offered her the copy the publisher sent me if she'd do a review. She kindly agreed. Below is [an excerpt of] her review."

Summary /Review of Michelle Alexander’s
The New Jim Crow-Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
by Cheri Paris Edwards

The New Jim Crow
by Michelle Alexander

Racial control revisited In “The New Jim Crow – Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness” civil rights attorney and advocate Michelle Alexander presents a well-supported argument that America’s prison system has been used to control brown and black people in this country. She likens this control to the age of Jim Crow where laws enforcing this sort of race-based system of control were legal. Alexander’s argument begins with an absorbing introduction that includes these disturbing facts:
1. “In less than 30 years the US prison population exploded from around 300,000 to more than 2 million, with drug convictions accounting for the majority of the increase.”

2. “The United States imprisons a larger percentage of its black population than South Africa did at the heart of apartheid.”

3. “In Washington D.C., our nation’s capitol, it is estimated that three out of four young black men (and nearly all from the poorest neighborhoods) can expect to spend time in prison."

Read the full review @ White Readers Meet Black Authors