Like any survey of any particular part of history, this book suffers from spending too little time on certain facets of its subject material. I also wouldn't recommend it to absolute beginners, because anyone who's still having trouble accepting that institutionalized racism is real and alive today in the United States is going to throw this book across the room in the first chapter. I did find the pre-civil rights era history illuminating and very interesting, and the book as a whole definitely made me want to read more. ( )