Showing My Color: Impolite Essays on Race and Identity

by Clarence Page

Book Overview

The Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist explores key issues of race, gender, and ethnic identity that have arisen since the civil rights reforms of the 1960s, with essays on the pervasive nature of... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060928018
• ISBN13: 9780060928018
• Release Date: January 1997
• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.3" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Informative and Thoughtful

This is a thoughtful look at racial realities in the USA. Author Clarence Page correctly examines racial divides as perplexing and multi-dimensional, while avoiding pandering and one-sided attacks. Page examines such hot-button subjects as victim-hood, affirmative action, middle-class values, relations between Jews and blacks, the widespread fear of young black males (which Page admits to), and the failure of many African Americans to grasp increased opportunities. Readers may not always agree with the author, but they can learn from him. I wish he'd gone further and focused more on Latino's and Asians, regional differences, plus hostilities between native and Caribbeans. Still, this is a welcome improvement over the many offensive "blame whitey" (or "blame blackie") treatises that prove so counter-productive. Clarence Page is a Pulitzer-winning journalist for the Chicago Tribune blessed with an easy-reading style. He's written a serious and thoughtful book about our racial divide, one that makes it seem a little less insoluble.

america is not a melting pot but a mulligan's stew !

what i loved about clarence page's book is it's very readable. i read it in 2 days and was able to grasp the concepts that he put forth in his tome. race is a subject that has baffled blacks and whites for ages; even our most intellectual peers are dumbfounded about how to confront this hydra. page shows us that by confronting race,we can get past race : we can begin to establish a dialogue between each other. page calls for blacks to get out of the "victim " mentality and take advantage of the opportunities available to african-americans. he also encourages blacks to build themselves up intellectualy and use their intellectual talents to survive in america. page then tells whites that they must get beyond their fear of black people and learn more about them and their culture and also be eager to embrace multiculturalism as a start to overcoming racial woes. the book is flawless ! what really startled me was page stated that in present-day america, most ethnic groups have begun to segregate themselves; blacks, primarily because they are tired of learning about whites and trying to relate to them in order or survive ( it has never been vice versa ! )and whites, because they are tired of defending themselves as not being " racist. " i have always been a cosmopolitan person, willing to learn from any culture and to love people simply as people. judging by the number of reviews of this book, i doubt if a lot of people will ever read it or take page's advice. it did my heart and mind good to discover it.

Great reading; very real; very informative.

Found book to be very enlightening and imformative; easy to read, understand, and relate to. Says what needs to be heard; unfornately many who need to hear aren't listening.

A must read for every white person in America!

Clarence Paige is a voice of wisdom in a discussion often dominated by the most strident, offensive voices. He pulls no punches about what race means in America, yet he offers hope. I plan to buy multiple copies to give to all of my friends, black and white, who often seem baffled or hopeless about the future of race relations in this country.