We Speak for Ourselves: How Woke Culture Prohibits Progress

by D. Watkins

Overview

From the row houses of Baltimore to the stoops of Brooklyn, the New York Times bestselling author of The Cook Up lays bare the voices of the most vulnerable and allows their stories to uncover the systematic injustice threaded within our society. Honest and eye-opening, the pages of We Speak for Ourselves “are abundant with wisdom and wit; integrity and love, not to mention enough laughs for a stand-up comedy routine” (Mitchell S. Jackson, author of Survival Math).

Watkins introduces you to Down Bottom, the storied community of East Baltimore that holds a mirror to America’s poor black neighborhoods—“hoods” that could just as easily be in Chicago, Detroit, Oakland, or Atlanta. As Watkins sees it, the perspective of people who live in economically disadvantaged black communities is largely absent from the commentary of many top intellectuals who speak and write about race.

Unapologetic and sharp-witted, D. Watkins is here to tell the truth as he has seen it. We Speak for Ourselves offers an in-depth analysis of inner-city hurdles and honors the stories therein. We sit in underfunded schools, walk the blocks burdened with police corruption, stand within an audience of Make America Great Again hats, journey from trap house to university lecture, and rally in neglected streets. And we listen.

“Watkins has come to remind us, everyone deserves the opportunity to speak for themselves” (Jason Reynolds, New York Times bestselling author) and serves hope to fellow Americans who are too often ignored and calling on others to examine what it means to be a model activist in today’s world. We Speak for Ourselves is a must-read for all who are committed to social change.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781501187841
Publisher:	Atria Books
Publication date:	04/23/2019
Sold by:	SIMON & SCHUSTER
Format:	eBook
Pages:	208
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

D. Watkins is editor-at-large for Salon. He’s also a college professor at the University of Baltimore and founder of the BMORE Writers Project. His work has been published in The New York Times, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, and other publications. Watkins is the author of The Cook Up: A Crack Rock Memoir and The Beast Side: Living (and Dying) While Black in America. He lives in East Baltimore.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Part 1 Down Bottom

Chapter 1 Where I Come From 11

Chapter 2 Just Pass the Mic 21

Chapter 3 The Hurdles 25

Chapter 4 The Tradition of Failure 33

Chapter 5 Too Poor for Pop Culture 39

Chapter 6 No Retirement for the Hustlers 57

Part 2 The Biggest Gang in America

Chapter 7 An American Tradition 65

Chapter 8 How Our Trust Is Undone 79

Chapter 9 The Baltimore Uprising 85

Part 3 Never Patriots

Chapter 10 I'm Sick of Woke 99

Chapter 11 Are You a Real One? 107

Chapter 12 Intellectually Curious or Racist? 129

Part 4 Proximity

Chapter 13 Be the Person You Needed Growing Up 149

Chapter 14 There Are No Shortcuts to Change 167

Chapter 15 Don't Make It Out, Make It Better 175

Afterword 179

Acknowledgments 185

We Speak for Ourselves Playlist 187

Editorial Reviews

03/04/2019

In this thoughtful and humorous take on race in America, Watkins (The Beast Side), an essayist and professor, argues that experts who have “strangely no connection to the black people they claim they are fighting for” often overshadow those of “people from the street.” The book includes Watkins’s recollections of growing up in eastern Baltimore (playing basketball with friends, nightly gunfire, murdered peers, selling drugs, and hustling for money) and of his professional rise, kick-started by a 2014 essay in Salon about class-based limitations on access to information. Speaking more systemically, Watkins outlines the hurdles facing black Americans—underfunded schools, racist police, corrupt housing practices, high interest rates from banks—with facts, figures where relevant, and examples from news stories. He decries performatively “woke” activists who may participate in a protest or show up for a photo, but don’t do what would really help: staying in a community, getting to know its residents, and contributing by, for example, teaching marketable skills or serving as role models. Watkins’s appealingly conversational prose and insight about current events keep the pages turning. This excellent exploration will appeal to anyone interested in race in America. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

Watkins anchors his new collection of essays in the voices, language, everyday realities, and dreams of black citizens... offer[ing] deep critiques of the elitism and respectability that directly and indirectly censor voices. A strong offering that brings nuance and multiplicity to readers attempting to decipher the black male urban experience while uplifting the stories, visions, and love that incubated a rising star.” - Kirkus Reviews

“Reading We Speak for Ourselves, I can’t help but admire D Watkins. He is not another elite voice for the voiceless. He is, this book is, an amplifier of low income Black voices who have their own voices and have no problem using them. He dares us to listen.” —Ibram X. Kendi, National Book Award-winning author of Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America

"In a time of blunt-bladed posturing and hyperbolized impact, We Speak For Ourselves, is a sharp gash into the psyche of America. Written as a relentless slice of his own life, Watkins avoids pretense as he puts language to his jagged experiences, not to encourage voyeurism, but to instead push people to grapple and wrestle with the real lives so many talking heads attempt to muzzle, then fictionalize. Watkins has come to remind us, everyone deserves the opportunity to speak for themselves. Everyone." - Jason Reynolds, New York Times bestselling author & National Book Award finalist, Long Way Down

“We Speak for Ourselves is full of insight into the America that serves as grist for the American dream. Its pages are abundant with wisdom and wit; integrity and love, not to mention enough laughs for a stand-up comedy routine. Over and over again, I found myself saying ‘yes, yes, he’s right’ and ultimately finished feeling inspired to do better, to be more. D Watkins proves, once again, why he isn’t just a writer of the people but a people’s literary champ for the here, now, and tomorrow.” –Mitchell S. Jackson, author of Survival Math: Notes on an All-American Family

“We Speak For Ourselves is an ode to those Black people who understand that the first place so many of us honed our understandings of knotty U.S. racial politics was in an American city, or rural town, fashioned as a ‘hood’ in the public imagination. Watkins writes with a type of profound love for the Black forgotten that will compel all who read his timely words to never forget the Black people and places so many cultural critics and thought leaders disremember with ease.” - Darnell L Moore, author of No Ashes in the Fire: Coming of Age Black & Free in America

“Watkins’ latest work shows the black community is not a monolith. Even as we may wear the iconic t-shirts of the struggle yet have different thoughts about the issues faced. We are a diverse and proud community, trying to come to grips with who we are; sometimes wearing a mask within our own brother and sisterhood.” – April Ryan, Under Fire: Reporting from the Front Lines of the Trump White House

Praise for D. Watkins:

“D. Watkins is uniquely equipped to communicate our political and social challenges of urban America, not only through the lens of academia but through empirical knowledge as well. He is the voice of the future seamlessly blending the wisdom of the streets and intellectual prowess in a way I have never experienced before.” —Jada Pinkett Smith

From the Publisher

2019-02-17

Watkins (The Cook Up: A Crack Rock Memoir, 2016, etc.) anchors his new collection of essays in the voices, language, everyday realities, and dreams of black citizens of his home East Baltimore neighborhood.

"In the midst of all the black narratives stacked on bookshelves, we have a problem—a major problem," writes the author. "People from the street are absent from them." As an emergent writer with a background in the streets, he found himself a piece of "celebrity" after landing a viral essay with Salon. The author continues to offer deep critiques of the elitism and respectability that directly and indirectly censor voices of the multitudes of black experience, and he explores what it means to be accountable to his people in his writings. While these communities are overtly susceptible to the imposed hurdles of systemic racism, their experiences and worldviews don't easily conform to the #StayWoke packaging of mainstream black-led protest movements. As such, Watkins stresses the importance of letting more people speak for themselves and combining voice with action on a wide variety of institutional and structural forces that impede black progress. He touches on topics such as education, policing, food deserts, poor housing, drug markets, structural poverty, and more. "The days of one black savior are over," he writes. "Most of the people who identify as black leaders in the mainstream are too famous to directly interact with the people who need them the most. I learned to rethink what a leader is, what a mentor is, and how to be a valuable ally." Ultimately, being driven by "a whole lot of love" has allowed him to realize that the greatest rewards lie within the work. As he writes, he is "blessed in being able to try" as he continues to bring East Baltimore to the world.

A strong offering that brings nuance and multiplicity to readers attempting to decipher the black male urban experience while uplifting the stories, visions, and love that incubated a rising star.

Kirkus Reviews