Jeff Chang

Jeff Chang & Rebecca Solnit

discussing

We Gon' Be Alright
Notes on Race and Resegregation

from Picador Press

In these provocative, powerful essays acclaimed writer/journalist Jeff Chang (Can't Stop Won't Stop, Who We Be) takes an incisive and wide-ranging look at the recent tragedies and widespread protests that have shaken the country. Through deep reporting with key activists and thinkers, passionately personal writing, and distinguished cultural criticism, We Gon' Be Alright links #BlackLivesMatter to #OscarsSoWhite, Ferguson to Washington D.C., the Great Migration to resurgent nativism. Chang explores the rise and fall of the idea of "diversity," the roots of student protest, changing ideas about Asian Americanness, and the impact of a century of racial separation in housing. He argues that resegregation is the unexamined condition of our time, the undoing of which is key to moving the nation forward to racial justice and cultural equity.

JEFF CHANG is the author of Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation and Who We Be: A Cultural History of Race in Post–Civil Rights America. He has been a USA Ford Fellow in Literature and the winner of the American Book Award and the Asian American Literary Award. He is the executive director of the Institute for Diversity in the Arts at Stanford University. Visit: http://cantstopwontstop.com/

Praise for We Gon' Be Alright:

"When absorbed individually, the author's incisive essays will educate and inform readers. Collectively, Chang creates a chain-linked manifesto arguing for an end to racially charged violence and discrimination and urging global open-mindedness to the struggle of the oppressed. … A compelling and intellectually thought-provoking exploration of the quagmire of race relations."—Kirkus Reviews (starred)

"With simple, elegant prose coupled with remarkable scholarship, Jeff Chang’s We Gon' Be Alright, moves us beyond autobiography into an illuminated landscape of penetrating facts and underlining unavoidable truths. In these pages, one learns the meaning and devastating effects of resegregation, inequity, and the systems of power that maintain them. Connecting the dots from federal housing policies of the 1960's and the sparks of Ferguson to the political rise of Donald Trump and the bittersweet sorrow of Beyoncé’s Lemonade, We Gon' Be Alright captures the crisis of this historical moment even as it propels us toward action for a future we can only imagine. It’s been a long while since 'just the facts, please' was a real page-turner. For anyone interested in the realities shaping the cultural landscape, read it and share it. The clarity of vision is unparalleled. Chang has truly nailed it!"—Carrie Mae Weems, visual artist

"Race has been fraught since its invention; this is to be expected of an enduring fiction that draws real blood. When it comes to navigating the minefields of race—its myths and material consequences, its currents and contradictions—Jeff Chang is a maestro. With eloquence and urgency, We Gon’ Be Alright reveals a country whose deepening racial oppression and inequality is shrouded by myths of colorblindness and postracial triumphalism. Diversity trumps equity, racial innocence trumps history, gentrification trumps resegregation, performance trumps power, and a Trump America trumps any possibility of a liberated America. But reversing course, Chang tells us, requires truth and reconciliation, struggle and transfiguration, and a movement governed by love and full of grace."—Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original

"There is no more fitting writer to chronicle an unprecedented moment in American history than Jeff Chang. We Gon’ Be Alright is a seminal work about now, about who we are and who we are becoming." —Jose Antonio Vargas, Founder and CEO of Define American