The Third Reconstruction: America’s Struggle for Racial Justice in the Twenty-first Century by Peniel E. Joseph

“The white riot of January 6, 2021, at the U.S. Capitol Building is impossible to understand without reference to earlier, yet strikingly similar, efforts during the First Reconstruction period. In both cases, there were attempts to violently overthrow democratically held elections won with the aid of Black voters.” This book study, along with other material on how Black people worked and struggled for freedom for four centuries, will investigate the extreme pushback by whites on all attempts for freedom, and how that freedom remains tenuous yet today not only for Blacks and for all non-white people, but ultimately even for white people.

Please come to the first session having read the Introduction and Chapter 1 (to pg. 74).