I would say that this book delivers exactly what the title advertises, only it does not, in a couple of significant ways that center on the meaning of the word “conversations.” Provocations might be a better choice of words. The book is an edited series of interviews with key public intellectuals. The interviewer in each instance is deeply sympathetic with the interviewee, so there are no challenges to the respondents’ answers or assertions. There is no “conversation” in the usual sense of the word, as the questions serve to tee up already well-known and well-understood positions by well-known people. All of the essays that I read (or in some cases sampled or skimmed) were also afflicted with the disease of dense, obfuscating academic jargon. As Helen Lewis (The Atlantic) says, “The point of a public intellectual is to make wild arguments with maximum conviction.” …and in this respect the contributors have exceeded my expectations.

I should be more cautious. I am in every way, to use the antiracist language of the book, coded White. As such, silence would in this instance be the better part of valor. The book as much as says so on p. 33, where a question (a component, surely, of any real conversation), a question by a straw man (actually a woman philosopher), a question by a white interlocutor, a question that functions “to privilege whiteness even as it gives the appearance of something ‘progressive.’” She (the questioner) should see what is needed without having to ask the question. She cannot provide what is needed, so the question exhibits white arrogance. And her white power is instantiated precisely in posing the question. In other words, there is no room for conversation. Any effort to respond to such ignorant questions would rob the respondent of what breath they have left, which is better used to scream. That may well be so, given the sorry state of things. I am very well aware that the feelings of outrage and screams about injustice are well founded and fully justified. Racism and its violent effects are very much with us. Perhaps the most vivid, horrific, recent case in point is what happened to Eddie Parker and Michael Jenkins in 2023 (“Goon Squad Officer is Sentenced to 20 Years in Mississippi Torture Cases,” New York Times, March 19, 2024. “If What Happened to George Floyd Angered You, This Should Outrage You,” @JemarTisby on Substack). In such a context, outrage and screaming are more than justified, and the whirlwind we are reaping, especially as it is playing out in our national politics, will destroy white people.

…but outrage and screaming are not an invitation to conversation. So, it would be inappropriate for me to continue with a full review. It would be a waste of breath that can be better used by others. I cannot add to what has been said. Every additional word from me is, at this point, superfluous and an additional offense. Silence is what is required of me—except as I might wish to join in the screaming—and I’ve met the word count obligation incurred by the receipt of the free book, so I’ll quit now. I may finish the book in small doses, as I find screaming distressing. Which, come to think of it, is probably the point.

This book was received via LibraryThing Early Reviewers (LTER), a program by which publishers provide advance copies of books for review (or, as in this case, recently published copies—the book was released on September 23, 2023. I was notified that I had “won” it on January 26; I finally received and started reading it on March 1). Unfortunately, this book arrived as a .pdf with a large watermark in the center of each page. The watermark was a constant distraction (obscuring the words of 4-5 lines of text under it on each page) and the .pdf format made it impossible to change the font size on my e-reader, except by manually resizing each page, then reducing it to regular size to enable a page turn. I’ll not accept another e-book for review; it is not worth the hassle. LibraryThing does not dictate the content or tone of any reviews, so long as they abide by the Terms of Use publicly posted on the site. This review is my honest opinion. ( )

George Yancy,
Until Our Lungs Give Out: Conversations on Race, Justice, and the Future,
(Lanham, Boulder, New York, London: Rowman & Littlefield, 2023),
ISBN 9781538176436, pp.396.

--The United States philosopher and professor George Yancy interviews well-known and emerging critical, social, and activist thinkers in this book. He asks them about their thoughts on race, justice, and equality in the present day and looking into the future. The discussions in the book will ensure readers are up-to-date on topics like White supremacy in an international context, anti-Black racism, racism targeting Indigenous people and people of colour (BIPOC), the opponents of critical race theory, xenophobia, and Black feminist and trans views. Yancy’s book contains many voices of Black and Brown writers, intellectuals, and academics (p. xvii).

--Yancy explains the problem: ‘The interlocutors within this text share the understanding that there is a great deal of suffering in our world. It is my hope that readers of this text will feel the weight of such suffering, be able to name it, and to feel deep outrage and anger that so much suffering continues to exist’ (p. xiii). Yancy says the dialogues reveal the ‘truth’ about racism and, in defending the ‘have-nots’, he acknowledges that he and others, when speaking publicly, are resisting entrenched ‘hegemonic power, vicious evil, and warmongering violence’. He aims to advance racial equality, justice and peace and transform societies for the better. Yancy declares, ‘Like my interlocutors, I refuse silence and will scream if I must’ (p. xiii). Offering hope to the oppressed, he writes, ‘In a world where so many of us find it hard to breathe in different ways because of systemic forms of injustice, this book is meant for you’ (p. 1).

--The book contains nine parts and twenty-nine chapters, each an interview conducted by Yancy. His ‘Introduction’ begins by explaining his lived experience and observations of anti-Black racism in the United States; it is too-the-point and strongly worded. Part One (‘Whiteness as Innocence Must Die’) begins with Yancy asking David R. Roediger: ‘What is it about whiteness that makes it so hard to explain to white people the ways in which they are invested in whiteness?’ This is an original question – in the case of the United Kingdom – until recently, few people were discussing it (and conversations were narrow in scope) (p. 14). Roediger replies: ‘I came to think that the “knapsack of privilege” is not so much invisible as it is apparent and ignored. To use Charles Mills’ term, “white ignorance” is best understood as a refusal of knowledge that whites surely do have reason to possess’ (p. 15).

--The book is analytically rich and broad in its inclusion of many topics, as shown by the content of the book’s parts. The chapters in Part Two explore ‘Global Anti-Blackness’. Part Three’s speakers address ‘Racism, Education, and Practices of Freedom’. Part Four interviewees examine ‘Challenging White Foundations’. The topics in Part Five relate to ‘Assaults on the Black Body’. Meanwhile, Part Six is about ‘Matters of Faith and Religion’. Part Seven conversation debate ‘The Politics of Catastrophe’. Part Eight’s topics cover ‘Realizing (or Imagining) the Possible’. Lastly, in part Nine, interviewees express their ideas and thoughts about ‘White Mob Mentality’.

--The book's strength is its rationale, namely, to challenge the notion that the world has moved on and the debate about racial equality and justice has been addressed. Yancy’s book says this is not so, and the interviews with writers like Noam Chomsky, Judith Butler, Cornel West, Akwugo Emejulu, and Brian Burkhart make clear that inequality and injustice based upon race and ethnicity are ongoing in Western countries and elsewhere. The discussants’ ideas, concepts and arguments vary across topics, so there is much new information to digest, while the author’s interview style is clear and raises direct questions. News and human stories about African–American George Floyd’s murder by a White police officer in 2020, the Black Lives Matter Movement, and the history of anti-Black racism and colonialism are situated in a deep context incorporating structural, institutional, and cultural origins and developments. The long-view approach highlighting power and control is made clear to the reader.

--The weakness of the book is that it does not explore particular geographic regions of racism and dehumanisation, like Palestine and Myanmar (Burma)--and the Rohingya people. Notwithstanding, writer and filmmaker Frank B. Wilderson III’s interview (Chapter Five: ‘Afropessimism Forces Us to Rethink Our Most Basic Assumptions about Society’) comments upon the historical dehumanisation of indigenous peoples, Jews, and Palestinians (p. 85). Likewise, Yancy mentions this point on page one. Chelsea Watego’s chapter on Australia provides a comprehensive study of the plight of the indigenous people. Adele Norris’s chapter ‘Anti-Black Racism is Global: So Must Be the Movement to End It’ debates the case of New Zealand.

--Until Our Lungs Give Out is an important book on race and anti-Black racism that will command attention and reflection because it looks at the fundamental needs of humankind: equality, justice, and peace. These three complex yet important concepts are found in all contemporary struggles for liberation against the control of and violence by better-placed political actors. Race is a crucial factor because the lived experiences of Black and Indigenous peoples in the United States, Arabs, Jews, Roma-Gypsies, and Blacks in Western and Central Europe, and Australia’s Aboriginal peoples highlight the negative impact of majority-White governments and their conscious and unconscious prejudices. In Asia and Africa, White settler colonialism subordinated the indigenous peoples. Likewise, the Palestinians living in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem are discriminated against by Israeli Zionist policies that the White House and Westminster seem to endorse. Secondly, across the globe, for several politico-economic reasons, right-wing (neo-fascist) and ultranationalist governments have emerged that use identity politics to marginalise and criminalise minorities, migrants and the ‘other/them’. The voices of online right-wing conservatism and populism have proliferated in recent decades.

--On the other hand, the urban United States and Western Europe are increasingly sites of multicultural mixing, with interracial and interreligious marriages. Therefore, Yancy’s timely and frank interviews highlight how Black and Brown people will lead the struggle against White supremacy. In alliance, White antiracists will support the movement for race equality. After all, it is in everybody’s interest for peace and justice to succeed. University students, scholars, journalists, social activists and readers will find the book thought-provoking and an extensive research tool. ( )