SJE Book Resources for Learners

THE PURPOSE OF THIS PAGE

The Social Justice Education book resource page for learners lists several books ranging from racism, intersectionality, and race that are meant to develop and strengthen your understanding of social injustice and justice by guiding your self-exploration and self-learning.

CRITICAL THINKING AND SOCIOLOGY

• Education and Capitalism: Struggles for Learning and Liberation by Sarah Knopp & Jeff Bale
• On Intellectual Activism by Patricia Hill Collins
• Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire 
• Teaching Critical Thinking: Practical Wisdom by bell hooks
• The Sociological Imagination by C. Wright Mills

INTERSECTIONALITY

• Beyond Respectability: The Intellectual Thought of Race Women by Brittney Cooper
• Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment by Patricia Hill Collins
• Feminism is for Everybody: Passionate Politics by bell hooks
• Feminist Theory: from Margin to Center by bell hooks

POLICING AND POLICE BRUTALITY

From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor

POWER AND PRIVILEGE

• Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism by Safiya Umoja Noble
• Discourse on Colonialism by Aime Cesaire 
• Privilege, Power, and Difference by Allan G. Johnson
• The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism by Baptist Edward

RACE AND ETHNICITY

• An Indigenous Peoples History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
• Critical Race Theory: An Introduction by Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic
• Representing Race: Racisms, Ethnicity, and the Media by John Downing and Charles Husband 
• The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin

RACIAL EQUALITY AND JUSTICE

• Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds by adrienne maree brown
• Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor by Layla F. Saad
• Overcoming Our Racism: The Journey to Liberation by Derald Wing Sue 
• The Meaning of Freedom: And Other Difficult Dialogues by Angela Y. Davis and Robin Kelley

RACIAL INEQUALITY AND INJUSTICE

• Black Wealth White Wealth: A New Perspective on Racial Inequality by Melvin Oliver and Thomas Shapiro 
• Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson
• The Hidden Cost of Being African American: How Wealth Perpetuates Inequality by Thomas M. Shapiro
• The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B Du Bois
• White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide by Carol Anderson

RACISM

• Black Sexual Politics: African Americans, Gender, and the New Racism by Patricia Hill Collins
• Black Skin, White Masks by Frantz Fanon 
• How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi
• Racism Without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States by Eduardo Bonilla-Silva
• Racist America: Roots, Current Realities, Future Reparations by Joe R. Feagin
• The Everyday Language of White Racism by Jane H. Hill
• Understanding Jim Crow: Using Racist Memorabilia to Teach Tolerance and Promote Social Justice by David Pilgrim

INSTITUTIONAL RACISM

• Pushout: The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools by Monique W. Morris
• The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander

SYSTEMIC RACISM

• Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Davis
• Systemic Racism: A Theory of Oppression by Joe R. Feagin 

SLAVERY

The Transatlantic Slave Trade: A History, Revised Edition by James A. Rawley and Stephen D. Behrendt

*Please note that this page will be updated regularly because this is not an exhaustive list of book resources for learners.