#AcademicRunPlaylist - 3/29/25

I think we got every kind of precipitation today, but at least I got to listen to a few Henry Louis Gates Jr. books for my #AcademicRunPlaylist!

First was "Stony the Road." Gates combines a variety of histories and writings to provide a rich analysis of the reconstitution of white supremacist ideology and culture in the post-Civil War decades along with the development of multi-faceted Black ideologies that mostly countered this narrative. Class lines clearly emerged within these Black intellectual traditions, making it harder to create a unified front against a more coherent revisionist narrative coming from white supremacists and bleeding into much of US society. There are some minor quibbles I have with this book, particularly on the poorly researched genetics sections as well as a strange aside on the validity of psychoanalysis (it's not). Regardless, this is an important, well-researched book that is unfortunately more timely than ever. Highly recommend https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/575769/stony-the-road-by-henry-louis-gates-jr/

Last was "The Black Church." This book traces the history of Black religion in the US from its earliest colonial beginnings to modern form. Along the way Gates introduces the different factors that led to the centrality of churches in the Black community and what influenced these churches to adopt forms very different than other US churches. Most interesting to me was the examination of the tight relationship between Black churches and broader Black cultural innovations - from music to political movements https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/624481/the-black-church-by-henry-louis-gates-jr/