Between the World and Me

As Toni Morrison proudly states on the cover of this book: this really is required reading! Coates talks so articulately and exquisitely about black identity in America. He has a frank and honest look at how American society historically has been constructed from the exploitation of the black body. This piece of text is addressed to his 15 year old son and it is brimming with Coates inner conflict between teaching his son the facts of life and sheltering him from the constant fear of knowing his black body is constantly under threat. This is such a poignant and heartfelt piece and it was so interesting to understand from the perspective of Coates himself how black spaces like ‘the streets' are a construct formulated by the dreamers (white people) to keep themselves protected from the real world. It is such a fascinating read and I cannot express all the interesting and valid points that Coates makes within this piece in this review. I will be discussing it in my February wrap up in more detail but to summarise. This is required reading for everyone so we can begin to understand that even race itself is a social construct and how we can all begin to take culpability for our inner histories regardless of where we were born or what skin colour we were born . It's a phenomenal read so please go and read it!