How We Fight White Supremacy by Akiba Solomon and Kenrya Rankin

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How We Fight White Supremacy by Akiba Solomon and Kenrya Rankin



                Have you ever asked yourself how you fight white supremacy? You’d have to define it first and then understand what it means before you could answer that. But once you understood what it meant and how you were affected by it, could you say how you fight white supremacy? It’s a question I’ve battled with for the last few years. Definitely more so since 2016. I don’t know if I have a single answer for that, especially when sometime just existing as a Black woman in the United States feels like an act of resistance. I gravitated towards this book because I wanted to see what other people had to say and how other people are fighting back. If nothing else, this book has shown me that there are many different ways to fight. People will do what they are capable of doing, and fight in the best way they know how.
                This book is a collection of many things. It has poetry, essays, interviews, question and answer sessions and music. It’s not a monolith of one note statements meant to inspire you to move, but these different elements all bring different levels of hope. Separated into different themes it brings all of these elements into focus. Solomon and Rankin end each section with their own thoughts and reflections. Those reflections ground everything and invite you to reflect on your own position in all of this.
                I enjoyed this book. I liked how there were so many different people expressing themselves in so many different ways. This book shows example after example of the different ways Black people, whether they are men, women, part of the LGBTQ community, musicians, artists, all of these people are fighting and the fight is taking place on so many different levels. This isn’t a book that sets out to tell you what to do. But it is a book that shows you that your fight will be your own, that many other people have chosen their way to fight and you can also find yours. I highly recommend this book. I give it 4 out of 5 stars. 

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