The Author (Michael Eric Dyson)

Michael Eric Dyson is black (to use his, and the book’s, own terminology), a Baptist pastor, and an academic specializing in sociology. He has become a recognizable commentator on American television, giving voice and presence to the same issues and concerns that he addresses in this book. Specifically, he speaks and writes about the experience of being black in an America primarily governed by what he calls “whiteness,” the perspective that, according to Dyson, white people are both entitled and superior to non-whites, simply because they are white. It is a perspective he does not share and, in fact, argues against in his books (including this one) and his television appearances.

Dyson writes with the voice of experience, describing in detail things that have happened to him, his father, and his children as a result of the pigmentation of their skin. He...