Sundown Towns: A Hidden Dimension of American Racism [J0055]

2006 - PB Nice clean condition. James W. Loewen, exposes the secret communities and hotbeds of racial injustice that sprung up throughout the twentieth century unnoticed, forcing us to reexamine race relations in the United States. In this groundbreaking work, bestselling sociologist James W. Loewen, author of the national bestseller Lies My Teacher Told Me, brings to light decades of hidden racial exclusion in America. In a provocative, sweeping analysis of American residential patterns, Loewen uncovers the thousands of "sundown towns"-almost exclusively white towns where it was an unspoken rule that blacks could not live there-that cropped up throughout the twentieth century, most of them located outside of the South. These towns used everything from legal formalities to violence to create homogenous Caucasian communities-and their existence has gone unexamined until now. For the first time, Loewen takes a long, hard look at the history, sociology, and continued existence of these towns, contributing an essential new chapter to the study of American race relations. Sundown Towns combines personal narrative, history, and analysis to create a readable picture of this previously unknown American institution all written with Loewen's trademark honesty and thoroughness.

From recent-ish Amazon/GoodReads reviews: "I had no idea about sundown towns —but this book set me straight. And unlike many nonfiction books based on research, Loewen actually provides solutions in the last chapter. I would love someday to leave this world knowing things were better, and he provides a roadmap for getting there. If you, like me, feel you need to know more and do more, please consider reading this book. This, or something like it, should probably be required reading in our schools--because so much of this has been hidden from us and/or minimized, and much of the battle is simply knowing."; "Incredibly important book. Adds a lot of historical context to current U.S. political climate."; "This was a great book for better understanding America's history of racism from the Civil War to modern times."