White Trash
The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $22.50
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Kirsten Potter
-
By:
-
Nancy Isenberg
About this listen
The New York Times bestseller
A New York Times Notable and Critics’ Top Book of 2016
Longlisted for the PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction
One of NPR's 10 Best Books Of 2016 Faced Tough Topics Head On
NPR's Book Concierge Guide To 2016’s Great Reads
San Francisco Chronicle's Best of 2016: 100 recommended books
A Washington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of 2016
Globe & Mail 100 Best of 2016
“Formidable and truth-dealing . . . necessary.”—The New York Times
“This eye-opening investigation into our country’s entrenched social hierarchy is acutely relevant.” —O Magazine
In her groundbreaking bestselling history of the class system in America, Nancy Isenberg upends history as we know it by taking on our comforting myths about equality and uncovering the crucial legacy of the ever-present, always embarrassing—if occasionally entertaining—poor white trash.
“When you turn an election into a three-ring circus, there’s always a chance that the dancing bear will win,” says Isenberg of the political climate surrounding Sarah Palin. And we recognize how right she is today. Yet the voters who boosted Trump all the way to the White House have been a permanent part of our American fabric, argues Isenberg.
The wretched and landless poor have existed from the time of the earliest British colonial settlement to today's hillbillies. They were alternately known as “waste people,” “offals,” “rubbish,” “lazy lubbers,” and “crackers.” By the 1850s, the downtrodden included so-called “clay eaters” and “sandhillers,” known for prematurely aged children distinguished by their yellowish skin, ragged clothing, and listless minds.
Surveying political rhetoric and policy, popular literature and scientific theories over four hundred years, Isenberg upends assumptions about America’s supposedly class-free society–where liberty and hard work were meant to ensure real social mobility. Poor whites were central to the rise of the Republican Party in the early nineteenth century, and the Civil War itself was fought over class issues nearly as much as it was fought over slavery. Reconstruction pitted poor white trash against newly freed slaves, which factored in the rise of eugenics–a widely popular movement embraced by Theodore Roosevelt that targeted poor whites for sterilization. These poor were at the heart of New Deal reforms and LBJ’s Great Society; they haunt us in reality TV shows like Here Comes Honey Boo Boo and Duck Dynasty. Marginalized as a class, white trash have always been at or near the center of major political debates over the character of the American identity.
We acknowledge racial injustice as an ugly stain on our nation’s history. With Isenberg’s landmark book, we will have to face the truth about the enduring, malevolent nature of class as well.
©2016, 2017 Nancy Isenberg (P)2023 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
Poverty, by America
- By: Matthew Desmond
- Narrated by: Dion Graham
- Length: 5 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The United States, the richest country on earth, has more poverty than any other advanced democracy. Why? Why does this land of plenty allow one in every eight of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and die on the streets, and authorize its corporations to pay poverty wages?
-
-
A testimonial based on facts and witness
- By Alonzo Nightjar on 03-27-23
By: Matthew Desmond
-
The Devil Is Here in These Hills
- West Virginia’s Coal Miners and Their Battle for Freedom
- By: James Green
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From before the dawn of the 20th century until the arrival of the New Deal, one of the most protracted and deadly labor struggles in American history was waged in West Virginia. On one side were powerful corporations whose millions bought armed guards and political influence. On the other side were 50,000 mine workers, the nation's largest labor union, and the legendary "miners' angel", Mother Jones.
-
-
Phenomenal labor history, riveting narrative
- By Chris Brooks on 03-11-18
By: James Green
-
The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy
- And the Path to a Shared American Future
- By: Robert P. Jones
- Narrated by: Holter Graham
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Beginning with contemporary efforts to reckon with the legacy of white supremacy in America, Jones returns to the fateful year when a little-known church doctrine emerged that shaped the way five centuries of European Christians would understand the “discovered” world and the people who populated it. From this vantage point, Jones illuminates how the enslavement of Africans was not America’s original sin but, rather, the continuation of acts of genocide and dispossession flowing from the first European contact with Native Americans.
-
-
The Doctrine of discovery matters to our history
- By Adam Shields on 09-13-23
By: Robert P. Jones
-
Caste
- The Origins of Our Discontents
- By: Isabel Wilkerson
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 15 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this brilliant book, Isabel Wilkerson gives us a masterful portrait of an unseen phenomenon in America as she explores, through an immersive, deeply researched narrative and stories about real people, how America today and throughout its history has been shaped by a hidden caste system, a rigid hierarchy of human rankings. Beautifully written, original, and revealing, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents is an eye-opening story of people and history, and a reexamination of what lies under the surface of ordinary lives and of American life today.
-
-
Brilliant, articulate, highly listenable.
- By GM on 08-05-20
By: Isabel Wilkerson
-
War on the Run: The Epic Story of Robert Rogers and the Conquest of America's First Frontier
- By: John F. Ross
- Narrated by: Jonathan Yen
- Length: 21 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Often hailed as the godfather of today's elite special forces, Robert Rogers trained and led an unorthodox unit of green provincials, raw woodsmen, farmers, and Indian scouts on "impossible" missions in colonial America that are still the stuff of soldiers' legend. The child of marginalized Scots-Irish immigrants, Rogers learned to survive in New England's dark and deadly forests, grasping, as did few others, that a new world required new forms of warfare. John F. Ross not only re-creates Rogers's life and his spectacular battles with breathtaking immediacy and meticulous accuracy...
-
-
WOW!!!
- By Olaf the Black on 11-23-18
By: John F. Ross
-
White Fragility
- Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
- By: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, Michael Eric Dyson - foreword
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this “vital, necessary, and beautiful book” (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility and “allows us to understand racism as a practice not restricted to 'bad people'" (Claudia Rankine). Referring to the defensive moves white people make when challenged racially, white fragility is characterized by emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt and by behaviors including argumentation and silence. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium and prevent meaningful cross-racial dialogue.
-
-
Word salad
- By Eric on 03-10-20
By: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, and others
-
Poverty, by America
- By: Matthew Desmond
- Narrated by: Dion Graham
- Length: 5 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The United States, the richest country on earth, has more poverty than any other advanced democracy. Why? Why does this land of plenty allow one in every eight of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and die on the streets, and authorize its corporations to pay poverty wages?
-
-
A testimonial based on facts and witness
- By Alonzo Nightjar on 03-27-23
By: Matthew Desmond
-
The Devil Is Here in These Hills
- West Virginia’s Coal Miners and Their Battle for Freedom
- By: James Green
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From before the dawn of the 20th century until the arrival of the New Deal, one of the most protracted and deadly labor struggles in American history was waged in West Virginia. On one side were powerful corporations whose millions bought armed guards and political influence. On the other side were 50,000 mine workers, the nation's largest labor union, and the legendary "miners' angel", Mother Jones.
-
-
Phenomenal labor history, riveting narrative
- By Chris Brooks on 03-11-18
By: James Green
-
The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy
- And the Path to a Shared American Future
- By: Robert P. Jones
- Narrated by: Holter Graham
- Length: 11 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Beginning with contemporary efforts to reckon with the legacy of white supremacy in America, Jones returns to the fateful year when a little-known church doctrine emerged that shaped the way five centuries of European Christians would understand the “discovered” world and the people who populated it. From this vantage point, Jones illuminates how the enslavement of Africans was not America’s original sin but, rather, the continuation of acts of genocide and dispossession flowing from the first European contact with Native Americans.
-
-
The Doctrine of discovery matters to our history
- By Adam Shields on 09-13-23
By: Robert P. Jones
-
Caste
- The Origins of Our Discontents
- By: Isabel Wilkerson
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 15 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this brilliant book, Isabel Wilkerson gives us a masterful portrait of an unseen phenomenon in America as she explores, through an immersive, deeply researched narrative and stories about real people, how America today and throughout its history has been shaped by a hidden caste system, a rigid hierarchy of human rankings. Beautifully written, original, and revealing, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents is an eye-opening story of people and history, and a reexamination of what lies under the surface of ordinary lives and of American life today.
-
-
Brilliant, articulate, highly listenable.
- By GM on 08-05-20
By: Isabel Wilkerson
-
War on the Run: The Epic Story of Robert Rogers and the Conquest of America's First Frontier
- By: John F. Ross
- Narrated by: Jonathan Yen
- Length: 21 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Often hailed as the godfather of today's elite special forces, Robert Rogers trained and led an unorthodox unit of green provincials, raw woodsmen, farmers, and Indian scouts on "impossible" missions in colonial America that are still the stuff of soldiers' legend. The child of marginalized Scots-Irish immigrants, Rogers learned to survive in New England's dark and deadly forests, grasping, as did few others, that a new world required new forms of warfare. John F. Ross not only re-creates Rogers's life and his spectacular battles with breathtaking immediacy and meticulous accuracy...
-
-
WOW!!!
- By Olaf the Black on 11-23-18
By: John F. Ross
-
White Fragility
- Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
- By: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, Michael Eric Dyson - foreword
- Narrated by: Amy Landon
- Length: 6 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this “vital, necessary, and beautiful book” (Michael Eric Dyson), antiracist educator Robin DiAngelo deftly illuminates the phenomenon of white fragility and “allows us to understand racism as a practice not restricted to 'bad people'" (Claudia Rankine). Referring to the defensive moves white people make when challenged racially, white fragility is characterized by emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt and by behaviors including argumentation and silence. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium and prevent meaningful cross-racial dialogue.
-
-
Word salad
- By Eric on 03-10-20
By: Dr. Robin DiAngelo, and others
-
Prequel
- An American Fight Against Fascism
- By: Rachel Maddow
- Narrated by: Rachel Maddow
- Length: 13 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Inspired by her research for the hit podcast Ultra, Rachel Maddow charts the rise of a wild American strain of authoritarianism that has been alive on the far-right edge of our politics for the better part of a century. Before and even after our troops had begun fighting abroad in World War II, a clandestine network flooded the country with disinformation aimed at sapping the strength of the U.S. war effort and persuading Americans that our natural alliance was with the Axis, not against it.
-
-
The fight to keep democracy alive
- By Rex on 10-19-23
By: Rachel Maddow
-
Black AF History
- The Un-Whitewashed Story of America
- By: Michael Harriot
- Narrated by: Michael Harriot
- Length: 15 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
America’s backstory is a whitewashed mythology implanted in our collective memory. It should come as no surprise that the dominant narrative of American history is blighted with errors and oversights—after all, history books were written by white men with their perspectives at the forefront. It could even be said that the devaluation and erasure of the Black experience is as American as apple pie. In Black AF History, Michael Harriot presents a more accurate version of American history.
-
-
LOVE It!
- By KMB on 09-29-23
By: Michael Harriot
-
White Too Long
- The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity
- By: Robert P. Jones
- Narrated by: Holter Graham
- Length: 9 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
“An indispensible study” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) drawing on history, public opinion surveys, and personal experience that presents a provocative examination of the unholy relationship between American Christianity and white supremacy, and issues an urgent call for White Christians to reckon with this legacy for the sake of themselves and the nation.
-
-
The scourge of White Christian Supremacy
- By Buretto on 07-30-20
By: Robert P. Jones
-
Democracy Awakening
- Notes on the State of America
- By: Heather Cox Richardson
- Narrated by: Heather Cox Richardson
- Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At a time when the very foundations of American democracy seem under threat, the lessons of the past offer a road map for navigating a moment of political crisis. In Democracy Awakening, acclaimed historian Heather Cox Richardson delves into the tumultuous journey of American democracy, tracing the roots of Donald Trump’s “authoritarian experiment” to the earliest days of the republic.
-
-
We’d be in a much better position if everyone read this
- By Jeffrey Schwartz on 10-01-23
-
Fallen Founder
- The Life of Aaron Burr
- By: Nancy Isenberg
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 19 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Generations have been told that Aaron Burr was a betrayer: of Alexander Hamilton, of his country, of those who had nobler ideas. But that version has been shaped by historians and writers from the 18th century on who were blinded by tabloid reports and propaganda created by Burr's political enemies during his lifetime. It is time to discover the real Aaron Burr.
-
-
Very Burr-Centric
- By Derek on 11-11-07
By: Nancy Isenberg
-
The 1619 Project
- A New Origin Story
- By: Nikole Hannah-Jones, The New York Times Magazine, Caitlin Roper - editor, and others
- Narrated by: Nikole Hannah-Jones, Full Cast
- Length: 18 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The New York Times Magazine’s award-winning “1619 Project” issue reframed our understanding of American history by placing slavery and its continuing legacy at the center of our national narrative. This new book substantially expands on that work, weaving together 18 essays that explore the legacy of slavery in present-day America with 36 poems and works of fiction that illuminate key moments of oppression, struggle, and resistance.
-
-
Comprehensive and Cutting
- By Thomas Ray on 12-30-21
By: Nikole Hannah-Jones, and others
-
Stamped from the Beginning
- The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
- By: Ibram X. Kendi
- Narrated by: Christopher Dontrell Piper
- Length: 19 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Some Americans cling desperately to the myth that we are living in a post-racial society, that the election of the first Black president spelled the doom of racism. In fact, racist thought is alive and well in America - more sophisticated and more insidious than ever. And as award-winning historian Ibram X. Kendi argues in Stamped from the Beginning, if we have any hope of grappling with this stark reality, we must first understand how racist ideas were developed, disseminated, and enshrined in American society.
-
-
Fabulous book, poor reader
- By EBMason on 11-15-17
By: Ibram X. Kendi
-
The History of White People
- By: Nell Irvin Painter
- Narrated by: Allyson Johnson
- Length: 14 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A mind-expanding and myth-destroying exploration of notions of white race—not merely a skin color but also a signal of power, prestige, and beauty to be withheld and granted selectively. Ever since the Enlightenment, race theory and its inevitable partner, racism, have followed a crooked road, constructed by dominant peoples to justify their domination of others. Filling a huge gap in historical literature that long focused on the non-white, eminent historian Nell Irvin Painter guides us through more than two thousand years of Western civilization, tracing not only the invention of the idea of race but also the frequent worship of “whiteness” for economic, social, scientific, and political ends.
-
-
Destroys the myth that race is about skin color
- By Emily L. on 08-25-14
-
Birchers
- How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right
- By: Matthew Dallek
- Narrated by: Donald Corren
- Length: 11 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the height of the John Birch Society’s activity in the 1960s, critics dismissed its members as a paranoid fringe. After all, “Birchers” believed that a vast communist conspiracy existed in America and posed an existential threat to Christianity, capitalism, and freedom. But as historian Matthew Dallek reveals, the Birch Society’s extremism remade American conservatism. Most Birchers were white professionals who were radicalized as growing calls for racial and gender equality appeared to upend American life.
-
-
Do not recommend
- By Michael F. on 05-21-23
By: Matthew Dallek
-
White Rage
- The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide
- By: Carol Anderson
- Narrated by: Pamela Gibson
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As Ferguson, Missouri, erupted in August 2014 and media commentators across the ideological spectrum referred to the angry response of African Americans as 'Black rage', historian Carol Anderson wrote a remarkable op-ed in the Washington Post showing that this was, instead, 'white rage at work. With so much attention on the flames,' she wrote, 'everyone had ignored the kindling.'
-
-
Good History, Was Hoping For More Insight
- By Mike on 09-08-16
By: Carol Anderson
-
White Cargo
- The Forgotten History of Britain's White Slaves in America
- By: Don Jordan, Michael Walsh
- Narrated by: Roger Clark
- Length: 11 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the 17th and 18th centuries, more than 300,000 white people were shipped to America as slaves. Urchins were swept up from London's streets to labor in the tobacco fields, where life expectancy was no more than two years. Brothels were raided to provide "breeders" for Virginia. Hopeful migrants were duped into signing as indentured servants, unaware they would become personal property who could be bought, sold, and even gambled away. Transported convicts were paraded for sale like livestock.
-
-
Indentured Servitude is a false term.
- By M. Cashen on 03-09-22
By: Don Jordan, and others
-
Masterless Men
- Poor Whites and Slavery in the Antebellum South
- By: Keri Leigh Merritt
- Narrated by: Keri Leigh Merritt
- Length: 17 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With the rising global demand for cotton - and thus, slaves - in the 1840s and 1850s, the need for white laborers in the American South was drastically reduced, creating a large underclass who were unemployed or underemployed. These poor whites could not compete - for jobs or living wages - with profitable slave labor. Though impoverished whites were never subjected to the daily violence and degrading humiliations of racial slavery, they did suffer tangible socioeconomic consequences as a result of living in a slave society.
-
-
A Story Seldom Told
- By Tigerron Wells on 05-04-20
Critic reviews
“Formidable and truth-dealing…necessary.”–The New York Times
“This eye-opening investigation into our country’s entrenched social hierarchy is acutely relevant.”–O Magazine
“A gritty and sprawling assault on…American mythmaking.”—Washington Post
Related to this topic
-
Stamped from the Beginning
- The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
- By: Ibram X. Kendi
- Narrated by: Christopher Dontrell Piper
- Length: 19 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Some Americans cling desperately to the myth that we are living in a post-racial society, that the election of the first Black president spelled the doom of racism. In fact, racist thought is alive and well in America - more sophisticated and more insidious than ever. And as award-winning historian Ibram X. Kendi argues in Stamped from the Beginning, if we have any hope of grappling with this stark reality, we must first understand how racist ideas were developed, disseminated, and enshrined in American society.
-
-
Fabulous book, poor reader
- By EBMason on 11-15-17
By: Ibram X. Kendi
-
A Fierce Discontent
- The Rise and Fall of the Progressive Movement in America, 1870-1920
- By: Michael McGerr
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Progressive Era witnessed the nation's most convulsive upheaval, a time of radicalism far beyond the Revolution or anything since. In response to the birth of modern America, one small group of middle-class Americans seized control of the nation and attempted to remake society from bottom to top. They accomplished an astonishing range of triumphs, yet the progressive movement collapsed as the war came to an end amid race riots, strikes, high inflation, and a frenzied Red scare.
-
-
A well balanced take
- By Ryan Mooney on 04-17-21
By: Michael McGerr
-
100 Amazing Facts About the Negro
- By: Henry Louis Gates Jr.
- Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman
- Length: 14 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With élan and erudition - and with winning enthusiasm - Henry Louis Gates Jr. gives us a corrective yet loving homage to Rogers' work. Relying on the latest scholarship, Gates leads us on a romp through African, diasporic, and African American history in question-and-answer format. Among the 100 questions: Who were Africa's first ambassadors to Europe? Who was the first black president in North America? Did Lincoln really free the slaves? Who was history's wealthiest person? What percentage of white Americans have recent African ancestry?
-
-
great book
- By Anthony Costello on 06-14-18
-
Stony the Road
- Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow
- By: Henry Louis Gates Jr.
- Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman
- Length: 9 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A profound new rendering of the struggle by African Americans for equality after the Civil War and the violent counterrevolution that resubjugated them, as seen through the prism of the war of images and ideas that have left an enduring racist stain on the American mind.
-
-
Valuable examination of Jim Crow and Rise of White Supremacy in America
- By William J Brown on 05-14-19
-
The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution: 1763-1789
- By: Robert Middlekauff
- Narrated by: Robert Fass
- Length: 26 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first book to appear in the illustrious Oxford History of the United States, this critically-acclaimed volume - a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize - offers an unsurpassed history of the Revolutionary War and the birth of the American republic.
-
-
Strong History Rich With Behind The Scenes Details
- By John on 10-06-11
-
Inhuman Bondage
- The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World
- By: David Brion Davis
- Narrated by: Raymond Todd
- Length: 16 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Inhuman Bondage, David Brion Davis sums up a lifetime of insight. He looks at slavery in the American South; the rise of the Cotton Kingdom; the daily life of slaves; the destructive internal long-distance slave trade; the sexual exploitation of slaves; the emergence of an African-American culture; and much more. A definitive history by a writer deeply immersed in the subject, Inhuman Bondage links together the profits of slavery, the pain of the enslaved, and the legacy of racism.
-
-
Very Useful Contribution
- By Biggar Thomas on 06-14-08
-
Stamped from the Beginning
- The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
- By: Ibram X. Kendi
- Narrated by: Christopher Dontrell Piper
- Length: 19 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Some Americans cling desperately to the myth that we are living in a post-racial society, that the election of the first Black president spelled the doom of racism. In fact, racist thought is alive and well in America - more sophisticated and more insidious than ever. And as award-winning historian Ibram X. Kendi argues in Stamped from the Beginning, if we have any hope of grappling with this stark reality, we must first understand how racist ideas were developed, disseminated, and enshrined in American society.
-
-
Fabulous book, poor reader
- By EBMason on 11-15-17
By: Ibram X. Kendi
-
A Fierce Discontent
- The Rise and Fall of the Progressive Movement in America, 1870-1920
- By: Michael McGerr
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Progressive Era witnessed the nation's most convulsive upheaval, a time of radicalism far beyond the Revolution or anything since. In response to the birth of modern America, one small group of middle-class Americans seized control of the nation and attempted to remake society from bottom to top. They accomplished an astonishing range of triumphs, yet the progressive movement collapsed as the war came to an end amid race riots, strikes, high inflation, and a frenzied Red scare.
-
-
A well balanced take
- By Ryan Mooney on 04-17-21
By: Michael McGerr
-
100 Amazing Facts About the Negro
- By: Henry Louis Gates Jr.
- Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman
- Length: 14 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With élan and erudition - and with winning enthusiasm - Henry Louis Gates Jr. gives us a corrective yet loving homage to Rogers' work. Relying on the latest scholarship, Gates leads us on a romp through African, diasporic, and African American history in question-and-answer format. Among the 100 questions: Who were Africa's first ambassadors to Europe? Who was the first black president in North America? Did Lincoln really free the slaves? Who was history's wealthiest person? What percentage of white Americans have recent African ancestry?
-
-
great book
- By Anthony Costello on 06-14-18
-
Stony the Road
- Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow
- By: Henry Louis Gates Jr.
- Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman
- Length: 9 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A profound new rendering of the struggle by African Americans for equality after the Civil War and the violent counterrevolution that resubjugated them, as seen through the prism of the war of images and ideas that have left an enduring racist stain on the American mind.
-
-
Valuable examination of Jim Crow and Rise of White Supremacy in America
- By William J Brown on 05-14-19
-
The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution: 1763-1789
- By: Robert Middlekauff
- Narrated by: Robert Fass
- Length: 26 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The first book to appear in the illustrious Oxford History of the United States, this critically-acclaimed volume - a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize - offers an unsurpassed history of the Revolutionary War and the birth of the American republic.
-
-
Strong History Rich With Behind The Scenes Details
- By John on 10-06-11
-
Inhuman Bondage
- The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World
- By: David Brion Davis
- Narrated by: Raymond Todd
- Length: 16 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Inhuman Bondage, David Brion Davis sums up a lifetime of insight. He looks at slavery in the American South; the rise of the Cotton Kingdom; the daily life of slaves; the destructive internal long-distance slave trade; the sexual exploitation of slaves; the emergence of an African-American culture; and much more. A definitive history by a writer deeply immersed in the subject, Inhuman Bondage links together the profits of slavery, the pain of the enslaved, and the legacy of racism.
-
-
Very Useful Contribution
- By Biggar Thomas on 06-14-08
-
A History of the American People
- By: Paul Johnson
- Narrated by: Nadia May
- Length: 48 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Johnson's monumental history of the United States, from the first settlers to the Clinton administration, covers every aspect of American culture: politics, business, art, literature, science, society and customs, complex traditions, and religious beliefs. The story is told in terms of the men and women who shaped and led the nation and the ordinary people who collectively created its unique character.
-
-
A British conservative's view of American history.
- By Mike From Mesa on 06-17-09
By: Paul Johnson
-
A Different Mirror
- A History of Multicultural America
- By: Ronald Takaki
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 18 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Upon its first publication, A Different Mirror was hailed by critics and academics everywhere as a dramatic new retelling of our nation's past. Beginning with the colonization of the New World, it recounts the history of America in the voice of the non-Anglo peoples of the United States---Native Americans, African Americans, Jews, Irish Americans, Asian Americans, Latinos, and others---groups who helped create this country's rich mosaic culture.
-
-
All mirrors distort
- By Michael on 04-02-17
By: Ronald Takaki
-
No More Lies
- By: Dick Gregory
- Narrated by: Prentice Onayemi
- Length: 10 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1972, during the Black Power Movement, iconoclast Dick Gregory challenged one of the foundations of America itself - its history, which had been written almost exclusively from the white male perspective. In No More Lies, this true trailblazer gave voice to African Americans, speaking their truth about the past and race relations in the United States. No More Lies offers this incomparable satirist’s intellectual, conspiratorial, and humorous spin on the facts.
-
-
My Hertiages
- By n/a on 11-25-22
By: Dick Gregory
-
The Strange Career of William Ellis
- The Texas Slave Who Became a Mexican Millionaire
- By: Karl Jacoby
- Narrated by: JD Jackson
- Length: 9 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
To his contemporaries in Gilded Age Manhattan, Guillermo Eliseo was a fantastically wealthy Mexican, the proud owner of a luxury apartment overlooking Central Park, a busy Wall Street office, and scores of mines and haciendas in Mexico. But for all his obvious riches and his elegant appearance, Eliseo was also the possessor of a devastating secret: He was not, in fact, from Mexico at all. Rather, he had begun life as a slave named William Ellis, born on a cotton plantation in Texas during the waning years of King Cotton.
-
-
Fascinating Tale of Racial Passing
- By Steven Schuster on 06-10-16
By: Karl Jacoby
-
An African American and Latinx History of the United States
- By: Paul Ortiz
- Narrated by: J. D. Jackson
- Length: 9 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Spanning more than 200 years, An African American and Latinx History of the United States is a revolutionary, politically charged narrative history arguing that the "Global South" was crucial to the development of America as we know it. Ortiz challenges the notion of westward progress, and shows how placing African American, Latinx, and Indigenous voices unapologetically front and center transforms American history into the story of the working class organizing against imperialism.
-
-
I had to return
- By Andrew Alvarez on 05-19-20
By: Paul Ortiz
-
A Renegade History of the United States
- By: Thaddeus Russell
- Narrated by: Paul Boehmer
- Length: 16 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
American history was driven by clashes between those interested in preserving social order and those more interested in pursuing their own desires---the "respectable" versus the "degenerate", the moral versus the immoral. The more that "bad" people existed, resisted, and won, the greater was our common good. In A Renegade History of the United States, Russell introduces us to the origins of our nation's identity as we have never known them before.
-
-
One of those books...that cause brain freeze!
- By Rory on 07-19-13
By: Thaddeus Russell
-
An Imperfect God
- George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of America
- By: Henry Wiencek
- Narrated by: Rick Adamson
- Length: 7 hrs and 30 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Washington was born and raised among Blacks and mixed-race people; he and his wife had blood ties to the slave community. Yet as a young man he bought and sold slaves without scruple, even raffled off children to collect debts (an incident ignored by earlier biographers). Then, on the Revolutionary battlefields where he commanded both Black and White troops, Washington's attitudes began to change.
-
-
Excellent handling of one part of Wahington's life
- By buffaloboy on 05-20-04
By: Henry Wiencek
-
The History of White People
- By: Nell Irvin Painter
- Narrated by: Allyson Johnson
- Length: 14 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A mind-expanding and myth-destroying exploration of notions of white race—not merely a skin color but also a signal of power, prestige, and beauty to be withheld and granted selectively. Ever since the Enlightenment, race theory and its inevitable partner, racism, have followed a crooked road, constructed by dominant peoples to justify their domination of others. Filling a huge gap in historical literature that long focused on the non-white, eminent historian Nell Irvin Painter guides us through more than two thousand years of Western civilization, tracing not only the invention of the idea of race but also the frequent worship of “whiteness” for economic, social, scientific, and political ends.
-
-
Destroys the myth that race is about skin color
- By Emily L. on 08-25-14
-
The 10 Big Lies About America
- Combating Destructive Distortions About Our Nation
- By: Michael Medved
- Narrated by: Michael Medved
- Length: 10 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this bold and brilliantly argued book, acclaimed author and talk-radio host Michael Medved zeroes in on 10 of the biggest fallacies that millions of Americans believe about our country - in spite of incontrovertible facts to the contrary. In The 10 Big Lies About America, Medved pinpoints the most pernicious pieces of America-bashing disinformation that pollute current debates about the economy, race, religion in politics, the Iraq war, and other contentious issues.
-
-
Truth
- By Dominique Bessette on 01-23-17
By: Michael Medved
-
America Aflame
- How the Civil War Created a Nation
- By: David Goldfield
- Narrated by: David Drummond
- Length: 27 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this spellbinding new history, David Goldfield offers the first major new interpretation of the Civil War era since James M. McPherson's Battle Cry of Freedom. Where past scholars have interpreted the war as a triumph of freedom, Goldfield sees it as America's greatest failure: the result of a breakdown caused by the infusion of evangelical religion into the public sphere.
-
-
Great and indepth
- By Kindle Customer on 06-02-14
By: David Goldfield
-
The War Before the War
- Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War
- By: Andrew Delbanco
- Narrated by: Ari Fliakos
- Length: 13 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For decades after its founding, America was really two nations—one slave, one free. There were many reasons why this composite nation ultimately broke apart, but the fact that enslaved black people repeatedly risked their lives to flee their masters in the South in search of freedom in the North proved that the "united" states was actually a lie. Fugitive slaves exposed the contradiction between the myth that slavery was a benign institution and the reality that a nation based on the principle of human equality was in fact a prison-house in which millions of Americans had no rights.
-
-
Great promise greater disappointment
- By Amazon Customer on 12-09-18
By: Andrew Delbanco
-
Master of the Mountain
- Thomas Jefferson and His Slaves
- By: Henry Wiencek
- Narrated by: Brian Holsopple
- Length: 11 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Is there anything new to say about Thomas Jefferson and slavery? The answer is a resounding yes. Henry Wiencek's eloquent, persuasive book - based on new information coming from archaeological work at Monticello and on hitherto overlooked or disregarded evidence in Jefferson's papers - opens up a huge, poorly understood dimension of Jefferson's world. We must, Wiencek suggests, follow the money.
-
-
Clear, Insightful & Iconclastic History
- By R.S. on 04-18-13
By: Henry Wiencek
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
The Problem of Democracy
- The Presidents Adams Confront the Cult of Personality
- By: Nancy Isenberg, Andrew Burstein
- Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 22 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
John and John Quincy Adams: rogue intellectuals, unsparing truth-tellers, too uncensored for their own political good. They held that political participation demanded moral courage. They did not seek popularity (it showed). They lamented the fact that hero worship in America substituted idolatry for results; and they made it clear that they were talking about Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Andrew Jackson. When John Adams succeeded George Washington as President, his son had already followed him into public service and was stationed in Europe as a diplomat.
-
-
Very insightful and rewarding adding understanding
- By William on 05-12-19
By: Nancy Isenberg, and others
-
The History of White People
- By: Nell Irvin Painter
- Narrated by: Allyson Johnson
- Length: 14 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A mind-expanding and myth-destroying exploration of notions of white race—not merely a skin color but also a signal of power, prestige, and beauty to be withheld and granted selectively. Ever since the Enlightenment, race theory and its inevitable partner, racism, have followed a crooked road, constructed by dominant peoples to justify their domination of others. Filling a huge gap in historical literature that long focused on the non-white, eminent historian Nell Irvin Painter guides us through more than two thousand years of Western civilization, tracing not only the invention of the idea of race but also the frequent worship of “whiteness” for economic, social, scientific, and political ends.
-
-
Destroys the myth that race is about skin color
- By Emily L. on 08-25-14
-
White Poverty
- How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy
- By: Reverend Dr. William Barber II, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove - contributor
- Narrated by: Bill Andrew Quinn
- Length: 6 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One of the most pernicious and persistent myths in the United States is the association of Black skin with poverty. Though there are forty million more poor white people than Black people, most Americans, both Republicans and Democrats, continue to think of poverty—along with issues like welfare, unemployment, and food stamps—as solely a Black problem. Why is this so? What are the historical causes? And what are the political consequences that result?
-
-
Cannot be antiracist without the ties that bind
- By marwalk on 08-25-24
By: Reverend Dr. William Barber II, and others
-
White Trash
- Los ignorados 400 años de historia de las clases sociales estadounidenses
- By: Nancy Isenberg
- Narrated by: Gwendolyn Flores
- Length: 22 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Examinando retórica, normas políticas, literatura popular y las teorías científicas a lo largo de 400 años, Nacny Isenberg rechaza las suposiciones sobre la sociedad libre de clases de Estados Unidos, donde la libertad y el trabajo duro te garantizan una verdadera movilidad social. Los blancos pobres miserables y sin tierra han existido desde la época del primer asentamiento colonial británico hasta los actuales "hillbillies".
By: Nancy Isenberg
-
Not "A Nation of Immigrants"
- Settler Colonialism, White Supremacy, and a History of Erasure and Exclusion
- By: Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
- Narrated by: Shaun Taylor-Corbett
- Length: 12 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Whether in political debates or discussions about immigration around the kitchen table, many Americans, regardless of party affiliation, will say proudly that we are a nation of immigrants. In this bold new book, historian Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz asserts this ideology is harmful and dishonest because it serves to mask and diminish the US’s history of settler colonialism, genocide, white supremacy, slavery, and structural inequality, all of which we still grapple with today.
-
-
Great if you can bear the narration
- By Tintin on 09-13-21
-
Fallen Founder
- The Life of Aaron Burr
- By: Nancy Isenberg
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 19 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Generations have been told that Aaron Burr was a betrayer: of Alexander Hamilton, of his country, of those who had nobler ideas. But that version has been shaped by historians and writers from the 18th century on who were blinded by tabloid reports and propaganda created by Burr's political enemies during his lifetime. It is time to discover the real Aaron Burr.
-
-
Very Burr-Centric
- By Derek on 11-11-07
By: Nancy Isenberg
-
The Problem of Democracy
- The Presidents Adams Confront the Cult of Personality
- By: Nancy Isenberg, Andrew Burstein
- Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 22 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
John and John Quincy Adams: rogue intellectuals, unsparing truth-tellers, too uncensored for their own political good. They held that political participation demanded moral courage. They did not seek popularity (it showed). They lamented the fact that hero worship in America substituted idolatry for results; and they made it clear that they were talking about Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Andrew Jackson. When John Adams succeeded George Washington as President, his son had already followed him into public service and was stationed in Europe as a diplomat.
-
-
Very insightful and rewarding adding understanding
- By William on 05-12-19
By: Nancy Isenberg, and others
-
The History of White People
- By: Nell Irvin Painter
- Narrated by: Allyson Johnson
- Length: 14 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A mind-expanding and myth-destroying exploration of notions of white race—not merely a skin color but also a signal of power, prestige, and beauty to be withheld and granted selectively. Ever since the Enlightenment, race theory and its inevitable partner, racism, have followed a crooked road, constructed by dominant peoples to justify their domination of others. Filling a huge gap in historical literature that long focused on the non-white, eminent historian Nell Irvin Painter guides us through more than two thousand years of Western civilization, tracing not only the invention of the idea of race but also the frequent worship of “whiteness” for economic, social, scientific, and political ends.
-
-
Destroys the myth that race is about skin color
- By Emily L. on 08-25-14
-
White Poverty
- How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy
- By: Reverend Dr. William Barber II, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove - contributor
- Narrated by: Bill Andrew Quinn
- Length: 6 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One of the most pernicious and persistent myths in the United States is the association of Black skin with poverty. Though there are forty million more poor white people than Black people, most Americans, both Republicans and Democrats, continue to think of poverty—along with issues like welfare, unemployment, and food stamps—as solely a Black problem. Why is this so? What are the historical causes? And what are the political consequences that result?
-
-
Cannot be antiracist without the ties that bind
- By marwalk on 08-25-24
By: Reverend Dr. William Barber II, and others
-
White Trash
- Los ignorados 400 años de historia de las clases sociales estadounidenses
- By: Nancy Isenberg
- Narrated by: Gwendolyn Flores
- Length: 22 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Examinando retórica, normas políticas, literatura popular y las teorías científicas a lo largo de 400 años, Nacny Isenberg rechaza las suposiciones sobre la sociedad libre de clases de Estados Unidos, donde la libertad y el trabajo duro te garantizan una verdadera movilidad social. Los blancos pobres miserables y sin tierra han existido desde la época del primer asentamiento colonial británico hasta los actuales "hillbillies".
By: Nancy Isenberg
-
Not "A Nation of Immigrants"
- Settler Colonialism, White Supremacy, and a History of Erasure and Exclusion
- By: Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
- Narrated by: Shaun Taylor-Corbett
- Length: 12 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Whether in political debates or discussions about immigration around the kitchen table, many Americans, regardless of party affiliation, will say proudly that we are a nation of immigrants. In this bold new book, historian Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz asserts this ideology is harmful and dishonest because it serves to mask and diminish the US’s history of settler colonialism, genocide, white supremacy, slavery, and structural inequality, all of which we still grapple with today.
-
-
Great if you can bear the narration
- By Tintin on 09-13-21
-
Fallen Founder
- The Life of Aaron Burr
- By: Nancy Isenberg
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 19 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Generations have been told that Aaron Burr was a betrayer: of Alexander Hamilton, of his country, of those who had nobler ideas. But that version has been shaped by historians and writers from the 18th century on who were blinded by tabloid reports and propaganda created by Burr's political enemies during his lifetime. It is time to discover the real Aaron Burr.
-
-
Very Burr-Centric
- By Derek on 11-11-07
By: Nancy Isenberg
-
Character Is Destiny
- Inspiring Stories Every Young Person Should Know and Every Adult Should Remember
- By: John McCain, Mark Salter
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
John McCain and Mark Salter have written three acclaimed best sellers, but Character Is Destiny may be their most influential and enduring book yet, a work for parents to share with their children and for Americans of all ages to read for inspiration and guidance.
-
-
It was OK, but not outstanding.
- By R. Mikesell on 12-07-16
By: John McCain, and others
-
The Devil Is Here in These Hills
- West Virginia’s Coal Miners and Their Battle for Freedom
- By: James Green
- Narrated by: Joel Richards
- Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From before the dawn of the 20th century until the arrival of the New Deal, one of the most protracted and deadly labor struggles in American history was waged in West Virginia. On one side were powerful corporations whose millions bought armed guards and political influence. On the other side were 50,000 mine workers, the nation's largest labor union, and the legendary "miners' angel", Mother Jones.
-
-
Phenomenal labor history, riveting narrative
- By Chris Brooks on 03-11-18
By: James Green
-
New Women in the Old West
- From Settlers to Suffragists, an Untold American Story
- By: Winifred Gallagher
- Narrated by: Blair Seibert
- Length: 9 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A riveting history of the American West told for the first time through the pioneering women who used the challenges of migration and settlement as opportunities to advocate for their rights, and transformed the country in the process.
-
-
No depth
- By Darcy Smith on 04-18-24
-
The Secret Token
- Myth, Obsession, and the Search for the Lost Colony of Roanoke
- By: Andrew Lawler
- Narrated by: David H. Lawrence XVII
- Length: 14 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1587, 115 men, women, and children arrived at Roanoke Island on the coast of North Carolina to establish the first English settlement in the New World. But when the new colony's leader returned to Roanoke from a resupply mission, his settlers had vanished, leaving behind only a single clue - a "secret token" etched into a tree. What happened to the Lost Colony of Roanoke? That question has consumed historians, archeologists, and amateur sleuths for 400 years. In The Secret Token, Andrew Lawler sets out on a quest to determine the fate of the settlers.
-
-
trying to capitalize on race relations
- By Phil on 07-16-19
By: Andrew Lawler
-
Masterless Men
- Poor Whites and Slavery in the Antebellum South
- By: Keri Leigh Merritt
- Narrated by: Keri Leigh Merritt
- Length: 17 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With the rising global demand for cotton - and thus, slaves - in the 1840s and 1850s, the need for white laborers in the American South was drastically reduced, creating a large underclass who were unemployed or underemployed. These poor whites could not compete - for jobs or living wages - with profitable slave labor. Though impoverished whites were never subjected to the daily violence and degrading humiliations of racial slavery, they did suffer tangible socioeconomic consequences as a result of living in a slave society.
-
-
A Story Seldom Told
- By Tigerron Wells on 05-04-20
-
Trash
- A Poor White Journey
- By: Cedar Monroe, Liz Theoharis - foreword
- Narrated by: Janet Metzger
- Length: 8 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Every day across the US, 66 million poor white people pay the price for failing whiteness. In this sweeping debut, activist and chaplain Cedar Monroe writes indelibly about and for poor white people: about unlearning the American dream, untangling from white supremacy, and working for liberation alongside other poor folks.
-
-
Excellent perspective
- By Amy Pavletich on 06-11-24
By: Cedar Monroe, and others
-
White Cargo
- The Forgotten History of Britain's White Slaves in America
- By: Don Jordan, Michael Walsh
- Narrated by: Roger Clark
- Length: 11 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the 17th and 18th centuries, more than 300,000 white people were shipped to America as slaves. Urchins were swept up from London's streets to labor in the tobacco fields, where life expectancy was no more than two years. Brothels were raided to provide "breeders" for Virginia. Hopeful migrants were duped into signing as indentured servants, unaware they would become personal property who could be bought, sold, and even gambled away. Transported convicts were paraded for sale like livestock.
-
-
Indentured Servitude is a false term.
- By M. Cashen on 03-09-22
By: Don Jordan, and others
-
Caste
- The Origins of Our Discontents
- By: Isabel Wilkerson
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 15 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this brilliant book, Isabel Wilkerson gives us a masterful portrait of an unseen phenomenon in America as she explores, through an immersive, deeply researched narrative and stories about real people, how America today and throughout its history has been shaped by a hidden caste system, a rigid hierarchy of human rankings. Beautifully written, original, and revealing, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents is an eye-opening story of people and history, and a reexamination of what lies under the surface of ordinary lives and of American life today.
-
-
Brilliant, articulate, highly listenable.
- By GM on 08-05-20
By: Isabel Wilkerson
-
White Rage
- The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide
- By: Carol Anderson
- Narrated by: Pamela Gibson
- Length: 6 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As Ferguson, Missouri, erupted in August 2014 and media commentators across the ideological spectrum referred to the angry response of African Americans as 'Black rage', historian Carol Anderson wrote a remarkable op-ed in the Washington Post showing that this was, instead, 'white rage at work. With so much attention on the flames,' she wrote, 'everyone had ignored the kindling.'
-
-
Good History, Was Hoping For More Insight
- By Mike on 09-08-16
By: Carol Anderson
-
Guardians of the Valley
- John Muir and the Friendship That Saved Yosemite
- By: Dean King
- Narrated by: Samantha Desz
- Length: 14 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In June of 1889 in San Francisco, John Muir—iconic environmentalist, writer, and philosopher—meets face-to-face for the first time with his longtime editor Robert Underwood Johnson, an elegant and influential figure at The Century magazine. Before long, the pair, opposites in many ways, decide to venture to Yosemite Valley, the magnificent site where twenty years earlier, Muir experienced a personal and spiritual awakening that would set the course of the rest of his life.
-
-
An engaging book on the history of Yosemite
- By Mark James on 03-27-23
By: Dean King
-
How the Other Half Eats
- The Untold Story of Food and Inequality in America
- By: Priya Fielding-Singh PhD
- Narrated by: Priya Fielding-Singh PhD, York Whitaker
- Length: 11 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Inequality in America manifests in many ways, but perhaps nowhere more than in how we eat. From her years of field research, sociologist and ethnographer Priya Fielding-Singh brings us into the kitchens of dozens of families from varied educational, economic, and ethnoracial backgrounds to explore how - and why - we eat the way we do. We get to know four families intimately: the Bakers, a Black family living below the federal poverty line; the Williamses, a working-class white family just above it; the Ortegas, a middle-class Latinx family; and the Cains, an affluent white family.
-
-
Narration is distracting
- By Rebecca on 03-17-22
-
White Rural Rage
- The Threat to American Democracy
- By: Tom Schaller, Paul Waldman
- Narrated by: Ray Porter
- Length: 11 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
White rural voters hold the greatest electoral sway of any demographic group in the United States, yet rural communities suffer from poor healthcare access, failing infrastructure, and severe manufacturing and farming job losses. Rural voters believe our nation has betrayed them, and to some degree, they’re right. In White Rural Rage, Tom Schaller and Paul Waldman explore why rural Whites have failed to reap the benefits from their outsize political power and why, as a result, they are the most likely group to abandon democratic norms and traditions.
-
-
Preaching to the choir
- By Mike on 03-07-24
By: Tom Schaller, and others
What listeners say about White Trash
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Charly
- 10-13-24
The best
The middle has a voice always in these writings. A gift to the generations behind us.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Annemarie Walsh
- 06-11-24
The system still lives on
Informative facts that rip the bandaid off. Needs to be converted to a mini series so more people can become aware of how the system works and begin to look to what has and has not worked to chart a course going forward
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amazon Customer
- 08-10-24
Class identify is a powerful thing
I loved the in depth look at different kind of white people and their struggle for class identity, thought out the ages. I also appreciate that this book didn't look down on the waste people of America but empathized with their choices and attitudes.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Mary Karty
- 11-10-23
A must read for anyone wanting to understand how we ended up so divided.
“White Trash” is a well researched and well told story of how England tried to get rid of its “refuse” people four hundred years ago and American policy and politics have been punishing and profiting off the poor ever since.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- James W. Hoffpauir
- 08-26-23
I have lived this experience and failed badly.
I was a freshman in high school when my school became the second integrated high school in the state of Louisiana and the only integrated school in my parish for six years.
The black students chosen to attend to this school were top academic students. The first year three seniors, then to as many as 49 percent of my graduating class of 1969.
We went to the oldest but, by then, least privileged school in the city. There weren't more than five or six altercations in the second and third years between the races. But it became obvious to both raced that we were looked down upon and despised by the white community elsewhere in the city. We soon learned to count upon one another at all inter-school events. By graduation time I had as many black friends as white.
In fact, us whites were accepted and treated well in the black community - something which I have experienced throughout the remainder of my 72 years to-date. And in other cultures - sometimes being the only American in the group for days on end.
I found that college proved to be a similar situation. While whites had to adjust to the experience of integration, I had no issues. This was noticed by blacks, whites, and professors.
Later, in the professional world I met with, and befriended black professionals. As we progressed up "the professional ladder" it became apparent to me that those black - as well as white professionals - had lost touch with the less fortunate of their own races.
I discussed my feelings of what we had done with a group of black and white colleagues on several occasions. We thought through the topic as a group and individually over a period of weeks. None of us having come from the privileged class, we soon understood what had taken place.
We also discussed how many of the people. both black and white, that "we left behind" had began to act as crackers, rednecks, and homies - looking for someone to blame and look down upon for their lack of upward mobility. Whether that be race, nationality, or regional in difference.
I thank you profusely for offering this study of human nature to the attention of the masses. Sadly though, I feel it will fall upon deaf ears all over again.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
6 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Rachel M.
- 06-02-24
Interesting look at class history
Isenberg makes some very good points but I’d like to see her take the next logical step. She talks about how white trash people have always been a part of America, but she doesn’t really go into the reality that without the “white trash”, the American dream couldn’t exist. If the wealthy patrician types were not able to demonstrate that there was someone less than the more middle classes, the lore of the American dream would fall apart and the people would be less malleable politically. The conceit that upward mobility exists in any meaningful way is one of the main reasons our current tax structure and political structure exist.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Robert E. Johnson Jr.
- 05-08-23
Thought provoking
Nancy’s book is very well written. The subjects covered required wandering through a number of what I would normally think of as unrelated subjects. However, she tied them together well. One error: LBJ didn’t defeat Pappy O’Daniel in the Texas US Senate race.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Donna Deal
- 04-03-24
Like a car crash- you can't look away
This is a stunning triumph of history, sociology and human endurance. The author's research and scholarship is flawless: she relies on primary documents to make her case, knitting together personal stories and political decisions that reverberate even today. This is an eye-opening narrative of the true history of our country, blasting away the myths of America being 'classless society,' and the 'work ethic.' Even from the very beginning of the Jamestown settlement, people were divided, condemned as not being 'good enough' and relegated to the trash heap. The author moves quickly from the past to the present... this is a book that should be read, must be read and the lessons within must not be disregarded. Much of the unrest and the current divisions in our country can be explain here. Don't look for our current trumpian chaos here, this was published in 2016, but you will find all rationale for his fervent, mislead followers.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Beverly Williams
- 09-03-23
An eye opener !
It kept my attention for sure!we have not changed much in 400 years. so sad.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Rosalyn Mendez
- 03-12-24
The actual analysis of race identity in America in the 21st Century
If you enjoyed Isabel Wilkersons "Caste, The Orogons of our Discontents, or the other masterpiece written by Thomas Sowell "Black Rednecks and White Liberals", you will absolutely love the insight and facts in this amazing book! It deep dives regarding how the English sent their unwanted to America, and unknowingly created the most powerful nation of immigrants the world has ever seen. 🇺🇸 A must read for every American!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
3 people found this helpful