Mary Ross | Site Director
As with the political climate, the social climate is tense right now. Over the past few years, we have seen protests and gatherings for Black Lives Matter, we have seen people raising awareness for climate change, fighting for equality across genders and sexualities. But for any social justice warrior to be successful, they must be educated on their topics. Below are a few social issues and books to read for more insight into them.
Climate Change: What Can I Do? My Path from Climate Despair to Action by Jane Fonda
Jane Fonda’s memoir describes her story as a climate activist in great depth. Featuring now only conversations and speeches by climate scientists and other climate activists, but also the personal hardships and information about many of the issues that collectively attribute to global warming and climate change, this memoir will give any climate activist much more information about their cause.
Climate Change: We are the Weather by Johnathan Safran Foer
Foer lays out the argument in this book on climate change that humans are the reason for climate change. Therefore, the human race is going to have to reckon with ourselves and our habits to save our home and our way of life. Laying out the habits we have that harm our planet, such as growing an exorbitant amount of animal products, Foer shows how what we do results in climate change.
Climate Change: Weather by Jenny Offill
Offill’s novel features a character named Lizzie, who is struggling with what it means to live life as usual while dealing with the global crisis of climate change. Something that many people struggle with, including myself, Offill asks us to reckon alongside Lizzie what we can do to change our daily life to help fight against the climate crisis.
Racism:Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man by Emmanuel Acho
Emmanuel Acho’s new book tackles systemic racism from its core, with Acho arguing that “You cannot fix a problem you do not know you have.” In this novel, Acho addresses many questions that people are too afraid to ask about being apart of the Black community in America. Talking about all these answers with compassion, he creates a space for people to understand racism and outlines how all Americans can just the antiracist movement.
Racism: Walking with the Wind by John Lewis
The late John Lewis’s memoir follows his life starting with his move from Alabama to Nashville, which was the epicenter for the struggle for civil rights in America in 1957. Once there, Lewis’s charisma and courage led him to be a leader in the movement. The rest of the memoir discusses his experiences with many of the major events in the Civil Rights movement all the way through the congressional election in 1986 which won him a seat in Georgia. As Black Americans are still fighting for equality in the United States today, this memoir can take you back to this era of the Civil Rights movement to see how to move forward from here.
Racism: I Can’t Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street by Matt Taibbi
Taibbi’s book outlines the death of Eric Garner, highlighting his life and influence on the world prior to his death. But Taibbi dives deeper into what exactly caused Garner’s death by discussing issues with law enforcement, procedures, systemic issues and more.
Ableism: Loud Hands: Autistic people, speaking by Julia Bassom
This book, which was written as a result of a project done by the Autistic Self Advocacy Network is a collection of essays. These essays are written by and for Autistic people, and serve to catalogue the experiences of autistic people as a way to band the community together and increase awareness for what it is like to live as a person with a different, but just as valid, ability status.
Albeism: Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen
Written by Emma Keeling: In the late 60’s, Susanna Kaysen was sent to a psychiatric hospital, McLean, at 18 years old after one session with a psychiatrist. Kaysen tells a vivid story of her time at the hospital, including her what her fellow patients and caretakers were like and the many progressive methods of treatment that were carried out in the hospital. This unflinching memoir is written in the form of a diary, although not linear in time, that includes specific diagnostic papers, notes, and medications Kaysen went through during her time at McLean. Mental health is treated completely different now than it has been in the past, and by reading this book, you could get a better notion of how we now think of and treat mental illness.
Feminism:We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
We Should All Be Feminists is a novel that discusses what it means to be a feminist in the 21st century. Adichie argues in this novel that participating in feminism will make it possible to build a society that is all-inclusive and successful. In Sweden, this book is given to every 16 year-old high school student to promote a culture that discusses these ideas and works toward them.
Feminism: Unladylike by Cristen Conger and Caroline Ervin
Unladylike is essentially a field guide to how to be a intersectional feminist. Discussing the patriarchy through bringing in history, statistics, social justice principles, double-standards and more, Conger and Ervin show how to fight for equality.
LGBTQ+ Rights: Female Husbands by Jen Manion
Prior to coining the terms transgender or lesbian, there were female husbands — people assigned female at birth who transition to men, and lived as such, marrying women. From colonial times to World War I, Manion tells the story of many ordinary people living such lives, even with such a huge risk in doing so. This book traces a complex history of the LGBTQ past to help understand how this past still impacts our world today.
LGBTQ+ Rights: The Gay Revolution: The Story of the Struggle by Lillian Faderman
Faderman’s The Gay Revolution is a more modern history of the LGBTQ+ struggle in the United States. Covering both men, women and non-binary folx, Faderman tells the stories, long and short, of several members of the LGBTQ+ community and what in society has influenced how they live.
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