volume of this presidential memoir, a promised land, former president obama reflects on his life and political career appeared pulitzer prize winning author isabel wilkinson explores what she called the hidden caste system in the united states. after that is the best of me, a collection of stories and essays by author and humorist david sedaris followed by china cartons modern comfort food and wrapping up our look at some of the best-selling books according to indy bound is a collection of comics by actor and comedian steve martin and cartoonist harry bliss. some of these authors have appeared on both tv and you can watch the programs online at otb .org. >> you're watching booktv on c-span2. every weekend with the latest nonfiction books and authors. c-span2, created by america's cable television company as a public service and brought to you today by your television

provider. >> now on book tv we are live with author and princeton university professor eddie claude who over the next two hours will take your calls and comments. professor claude's books include democracy and black, jerez still enslaves the merit console and the recently published again and again james baldwin's america and its urgent lessons for our own. >> host: professor eddie claude from princeton, in your most recent book and its urgent lessons for our own. ... the country had an opportunity to leave behind the reality of

white supremacy and how is organized our society, and each of those moments the country doubled down on its ugliness and we saw what some scholars like to call a backlash. that's dedougher toized. the welcome she saw an ongoing betrayal and when we think about the post reconstruction period, and the lost cause and the kind of sedimentation of ideology of anglosaxonism and what it meant for the united states and the world, that's a moment of betrayal. you think mid-20th century, the black freedom. no and the call for law and order, the tax revolt in california, the hard hat rebellion and the like, we doubled down on ugliness and here we are in this moment again, facing a chance to reimagine ourselves and if our history is any indication, we

have a steep hill to climb. >> has there been an, a of progress. >> guest: of course. in life isn't what my father's life was and his life wasn't what his father resident life was. so what does it mean to suggest that we live in the afterlife of slavery or the afterlife of jim crow in is to suggest that there has been some indication of change and progress, but you know as baldwin says america is always changing but never changes. one way to parse that is the true lie of american history is what i call democracy and black. and that is this belief that white miami matter more than others and that belief obtains no matter the material conditions. it's still organized and distributes the advantage and disadvantage in this society. >> what should be know about james baldwin, or as you call him, jimmy? >> guest: my goodness.

it's a bit hubris to call him jimmy but he has been in my head for almost 30 years now. what should we snow? a couple of things. one, he is an extraordinary example of self-creation. when you think about being born in harlem north suing hill but the ghetto of harlem, coming of age in the aftermath of the catastrophe of the great depression and welcoming himself into becoming one of the world's greatest writers. an extraordinary story. when we step outside of the orbit of white america's expectation ourselves we're talking revolution, and he embody it that insight. the second thing i think is his courage. his willingness to not only speak truth to power, to bear witness in such a way to make suffering real which is an example for me, but i think his

courage to risk self-examination in public to risk vulnerability, what i interviewed angela davis for oginni -- again again -- begin again help said he was out there by himself. after go tell it on the mountain, embracing even though he was critical of black power, continuing to bring critique to bear on american society as the black middle class was entering quote-unquote the age of the cools by -- cosby show. his courage and commitment to craft, discipline. so all of those things come to mind. >> that's the importance of his self-compile from the u.s.? >> guest: well, i wouldn't cull it self exile help called himself a transatlantic.

it's hard to live in this place and particularly hard for him but there are these daily cuts, the daily experiences of disregard, of and the need to acquire the distance so you can say somebody of substance about it. one way -- the way in which i lender is notice not so up as exile but baldwin seeking an elsewhere, stage that gives him the requisite distance -- [loss of audio] -- the cox policemen-to-the american ideology. when you're caught up in it it's difficult to say and action in such a way that allows you the elbow room to bring serious criticism. so i think baldwin needed that distance and although some of us can't afford to leave the country, we still need to acquire distance.

kind of establish a relevant distance from the operations of power so that we can say something significant and serious but its devastating consequences and when it's in operation if that makes sense. >> host: here's a quote from begin again. as i looked out into the ruins and thought of the election of donald trump and the ugliness that consumed my country, i asked myself, what do you do when you have lost faith in the place you call home? that wasn't quite the right way to put it. i never really had faith in the united states. in the strongest sense of the word. what do you mean by that? >> guest: well, i'm not a patriot. never been a patriot in any strong sense of what that word means. i've always had this uneasy relationship to this place. it has something to do with the tradition out of which i come. , that understanding the sojourn of black people in america places one at a particular angle

with regards to america's self-understanding, and so at the same time there is this kind of aspiration that animates the black tradition, black radical tradition in some ways, aspiration for a more democratic way of life, an as precision -- aspiration for a more just way of being together in this country. what happens when that i shaken, not so much one's faith in america as an idea but one's faith in the possibility that one -- that this country would ever change, you see. and that deep-seeded -- when you see that -- begin to feel that kind of rage and that kind of passion, joining with a deep-seeded doubt, it becomes very difficult to hold on to any kind of faith and struggle for democratic possibilities. so, i was trying to give voice in that moment that i'd never

felt at home in this place outside of being at home in mississippi with my family, but to be -- to feel unhoused in one's house, that's like the met metamorphoseness. coming to re realization one is seen as a bug. hard to find hope in those moments. >> host: when you think but wew due boys, martin luther king, stokley carmichael, malcom x, where do you place yourself in that spectrum. >> guest: never been asked that question. thanks, doc. some where -- i'm always dealing with my rage, always on the verge of spilling over in some ways. and then there's this love.

i guess this is why i'm so attracted to baldwin as a figure because he seems to stand in that space where rage and love exist simultaneously. so i think there is this -- where i stand is not so much between a kind of black nationalism and a black integrationism or black radical position or a kind of black liberal position. the typical way in which we render africa politics. some ways i stand betwixt and between. i'm not a liberal of course but there's a sense in which malcolm gives voice to my rage and to my desire to be courageous, and dr. king gives voice to my hope that i have a loving heart. so somewhere in between those things. >> host: in your 2016 book "democracy in black," you write

quote, obama was supposed to be more. obama was supposed to be different. we should have known better. nothing obama said actually confirmed the belief that he was some progressive savior. he is what he has always been. >> guest: i got interest a lot of trouble for that one, right? no. what i was trying to say we green framed him in the 2007-2008 election cycle. made him what we desired most. so, we made him the antiwar candidate, made him in some ways this avatar of progressive politics and he jumped in front of a range of grassroots movements, "black lives matter," in its stages of "occupy wall street." the antiwar movement, a sense that barack obama became in some ways the object of that

organizing, and so we displaced our hopes and aspirations on him, and he told us in his second book who he was. he told us exactly what he would do. he was very explicit that he was in some ways a liberal in the vein of the clintons in some ways, and we wanted him to be more than just a symbol. i know i did. i still remember my reaction to listening to the speech in iowa and thinking, my god, this could happen. what that might mean. and then we were confronted with how he governed. >> host: eddie glaude what was the important of moss point, mississippi to your philosophy to your being? >> guest: oh, my goodness. it's everything. i found myself when i first left our home to go to college, some ways trying to run away from it.

trying to imagine myself in more expansive terms than my little home town. moss point is everything, man. the smells from the plant, and the paper mill that would join with the scent of fall and how that all announced school. fish fries every friday. i grew up catholic. and we would eat seafood on fridays, and listening to the blues every weekend as we cleaned house, because my mother and father kept the blues on the radio on the weekends. being able to ride my bike and play baseball and -- i think in some ways the gulf coast -- the salty unless of the air, the seafood, the rhythm, i think it

finds its way in -- on the page, in the way in which i hear words, and the way in which i think. took me a while to come to terms with that but i'm a moss point baby, and it is everywhere in my work in some way. >> host: in your book you talk about quote-unquote running away at 16 to go to college. why? >> guest: you know, my dad is watching and i love him dearly but it was hard. he was an exacting presence in some ways. i look just like him. i have his hands. i have his smile. i have his anger. and i just felt like i needed to get away in order to survive. i think i'm really sensitive and

my dad could scare you with a glare, a stare, freeze you, and i think i needed to get away. he understood in his own way. i remember when i asked him, can i go to college? i had to get his permission, and we were sitting at the kitchen table, and he very clear, he know what you're doing. don't ever think you're not going to need me. quote-unquote. and lo and behold i lost my scholarship to morehouse in my sophomore year and without question he took a second mortgage on the house to pay for my college. so, like jimmy, jimmy is very difficult, hard on his stepfather in the early days of his writing but by the time we read the later writings, getting closer to his death, he

understand more. more generous and i love his -- my father and i our love is deep in so many ways. >> host: do you think you're parents share your political and philosophical leanings. >> guest: i think so. they're constantly calling me and telling me what to say on msnbc. that's hilarious. absolute limit intuitively. i think hough i see the world was shaped by that household. this insistence on maintaining one's dignity and standing. my family -- my dad and mom don't suffer white folks easily. they tell the story of when we first bought our home in briarwood, and briarwood circle in moss point, and as we were moving in the police drove by in their cruiser, and my dad just

dangled the keys and said, yes, i own it, it's mine. and when the neighbor decided he was going dig up the flower he had given to the previous owner, and my father asked him what are you doing? he says these are my flowers hundred he said, no, i bought this property, these are mine. the neighbor in the back of our home shot our -- someone shot out the back of our window and my dad responded in kind by blowing a limb off their magnolia tree or oak tree. there was a sense in which growing up i had -- i learned the lesson early that you protect your dignity and your standing at all costs. and you stand up for what it right. and no matter what. so even though i felt scared at times, because of the -- that glare that could come at you, my dad also instilled in me a kind

of insistence on being courageous in the face of injustice. atley these what's tell myself. >> host: has moss point changed. >> guest: absolutely. at one point we were this -- some people will fine it funny but bustling little town weapon produced extraordinary -- our high school was 5a. we produced all of these amazing football players and basketball players. remember as a young high school student, bear bryant walking into our cafeteria, looking for chris clauseal our nose guard. the wantly brothers, generation after generation of run backs who made their way to the nfl. now it's a smaller school, the town is quieter, folks have grown, a lot of folk grew up and left. there's the moss point diaspora

bus -- but still smell the plant think best seafood on the planet, still home. >> host: evidenceie god get is in masters in africa esteems in temple university and a ph.d in religion from princeton. three of your books are about religion. why? >> guest: i did -- when i left temple i went to princeton to work with cornell west and jeffrey stout, and so i did my ph.d in religion, and i've always been interested in politics, and at princeton, we have a subfield entitled religion ethics and politics, and when i was in grad cat school folks thought of it as a kind of princeton's second political theory department, and so i've always thought about religion as the kind of point of entry to the broader question of africa -- african-american

politics and so because of worked with cornell west and jeffrey, philosophers of american and al is an american religious historian. i found myself bridging these two areas where i wanted to think about philosophical questions, historically. wanted to think about politics with a deep and thick historical contextualization, and so religion became my point of entry and so my first book was about exodus and the exodus story and how it was used and deployed by early 19th century black political actors or when i think about introduction, african-american religion, uncommon face, these are kind of short -- small books that try to give some indication of my

historic sensibility, hough i think about african-american religion from a pragmatic and history countial perspective, and it has everything to do with my training, and has everything to do with the tradition out of which i come, where christianity in particular, african-american protestantism specifically is so important to understanding african-american life in this country. >> host: is christianity still important to you personally? >> guest: sure. yeah. absolutely. i was born and raised on the coast so i grew up in the archdiocese of biloxi. went to catholic church. the first mission founded by the joe fiefites on the -- josephites. and and by leaving this

all-black church, parish, and for the most part and then going to morehouse and being drenched in baptist waters of morehouse college and listening to the most extraordinary preachers, and then trying my own -- trying to find my own way in terms of my own religious belief, islam for a moment and the like, i came to understand that the stories that animate the christian tradition are credit dollar how -- critical to how i see myself as a human being. these stories offer a wisdom and insight to what it means to be loving in a world that seems to be intent on being loveless. would say the tradition matters but i come at it in my own particular way if that makes sense. >> host: i think it's in your become, exodus you identify yourself as a john dewey

pragmatist. what do you mean? >> guest: well, john dewey was one of -- is the towering american philosophical voice for me of the 20th center. he is part of a group who in some ways put forward from other philosophical view hases out in being so attentive to met fiscal truth or trying to -- truths but really understanding the capacities of human beings to transform their circumstances so there's a kind of skepticism or what we might call an antifoundationallism that rooted in a big historical sensibility that has everything to do with affirming the capacities of everyday ordinary people in determining their life chances and outcomes, and so i became

attracted to john dewey philosophically because in some ways i was at princeton. you still have the legacy of the late american pragmatism and then cornel west and i was a graduate student when he was working and john dewey was attracted to me precisely because he was still kind of critical of this western philosophical tradition in his own way, but he was also kind of affirming the capacities of everyday ordinary people to transform their circumstances, and he was setting the stage for this philosophically. so, what i have done is in some ways to bring american pragmatism, across the railroad tracks, to bring that philosophical tradition into

conversation with an african-american tradition of letters and the result has been my body of work. >> host: and his body of work is what we are discussing with princeton professor eddie glaude this afternoon, and we want to include you in the conversation as well. first off, here are professor glaude's books. in 2000, exodus, religion, race and nation in early 19th 19th century black america came out. in a shade of blue came out in 2007. african-american religion, very shorten throw ducks in 2014. democracy in black, how race still enslaves the american soul. 2016, and in 2018 an uncommon faith, a pragmatic approach to the study of african-american religion came out, and professor glaude's most recent book, begin again, james bald win's america and it urgent lessons for our own issue is brand new this year.

you can participate in the program this afternoon. you can do it by phone, (202)748-8200 in east and central time zone. if you have a question or comment for eddie flawed. and (202)748-8201 for those in the mountain and pacific time zones. you can also participate via social media. number one, our text line. (202)748-8903. send a text, please include your first name and your city if you would. and on all our social media sites here at booktv, facebook, twitter, instagram,@booktv is our handle and you can post a comment there and we'll look at those as well. we'll begin taking calls and comments in just a minute. professor glaude, is the chair of the department of african-american studies at prince top. what is the importance of having a separate african-american

studies program at a university. >> guest: it's absolutely critical because african-american studies is a clearly tee fined field of inquiry. -- defined field. it's a conversation over generations where you have different bibliographies that shape a body of knowledge that can be transferred from one cohort to the next. so, when i think pout african-american studies i think about a field that in some ways engages in a kind of descriptive enterprise and offers an account of the relevant subject matter at hand in a way from the vantage point of this particular tradition, people of african descent and has this critical component where insofar as we offer these descriptions of -- that change our orientation to knowledge production, it's

bringing critique, criticism to bear under ways in which we think about matters or what we take to be knowledge, and so i think it's important in a world as tie -- diverse as ours, in a country as complicated as ours, with its history as fraught and vexed as my colleague imani per perry would say, it's imperative we understand this fragile experiment in democracy from the vantage point of people who have had to bear the brunt of the contradiction. so when we think but african-american studies in its expansiveness, not only as a critique of white supremacy but also as a space for extraordinary literature, way in which we can think about the operations of power and social groupings, think about art -- it backs this amazing space to do all sorts of work and to broaden

our understanding of knowledge production as such. >> host: princeton's had a few issues, racial issues -- >> guest: just a few. >> host: -- in the last couple consecutive years. where do you come down on them? >> guest: princeton is a complex space. the place that eugene o'neill couldn't suffer. it's the place that edward said helped suffocate. it's the place that baldwin right down here on route 1, baldwin worked in and around this area, and he tells this story of not being served in one of the diners on route 1 and hurling a glad at the head of the white waitress and having to run for his life. princeton is a southern -- it bears the imprimatur of woodrow wilson's racism. there's a rain paul went to rutgers because princeton was a place that was not welcoming people like my mitchell father

or mother couldn't have attend princeton so it has is history. thought of as the southern ivy. always grappling with that wall she say undertoe, and i think the students who protested in term -- i think the -- those of students who took over the president's office, trying to in some ways make prince ton their own and to insist that princeton stop approaching black and brown students as if they're doing them a favor. to imagine itself as a place that would welcoming for all of americans and i think that aspiration is not only necessary, it's just, it seems to me. we're struggling with it just like the country. >> host: and the west college, i

believe, has been renamed -- the toni morrison building. is that correct? yeah. one thing about this current moment is that the builtin america reflects its racist commitments. it often announces that -- those who walk the hallowed halls are latecomers, the recipients of charity. don't see an environment that reflects the diversity of the population. and so the idea of west college, the place where students and parents come, that's where the dean of the college is, where the admissions office is. it's now named after toni morrison is extraordinary. can you imagine students, black students and brown students having to see woodrow wilson's

face and quotations every day and wilson is clear about his view of our capacity. he didn't think we were capable and you have to navigate that every single day? so i think that's the changing of the -- of west college is a wonderful step on the part of princeton. >> host: how is woodrow wilson treated now at princeton as the former profit the college, it's. >> guest: truthfully. i think that's the biggest shift. have to tell the truth. you cannot -- there's no way princeton can tell the story of itself without woodrow wilson. he is central to modern princeton, princeton wouldn't be the university itself is if it wasn't for that man. and what he did. but you have to the truth who he is. who he was. and so i remember from my

graduate school days, woodrow wilson -- stories about -- basically walked undammed water. now if you tell the truth and you understand the kind of valued you want to represent who you aspire to be, as a university, then you have to ask yourself the hard questions does widow wilson present who we aspire to be, represent who we center he is central to who we -- how we became princeton but the princeton of woodrow wilson is not the princeton i work at. sometimes, at least. so i think it's a heart the school is trying to tell the truth and grapple with the truth out bout woodrow wilson which is important. >> host: this is totally off the subject but it's in my head and i can't get it out. what was eddie s glaude senior's line of work? >> guest: my god. he was postman. delivered mail.

in mississippi heat. over 30 years. of delivering mail. i remember him fixing the same lunch every day on white bread, a baloney sap twitch with mayo and mustard, every day, and he didn't take one single vacation. he took his vacation days and spread them out over the year so each week he would have a day off and we used to dread that day he would have which would give him a long weekend because that meant we would have to clean up the house from top to bottom. but he was a postman and during the heat of mississippi, on the coast, it's extraordinary kind of thing to experience the mississippi summer. even with the breeze off the gulf. he would literally sweat out his

belts. he was a postman and then became a leader of the local union. the second african-american hired at the post office at pascagoula mississippi. >> host: tell us about your mother as well. >> guest: my mom is just amazing. my goodness. she worked at -- from my early days worked at burger king, and then she got a job at ingle shipyard, part of the janitorial screw the supervisor of the cleaning crew at ingles she worked the third shift. so she left home at 4:00 in the afternoon to go work, and would not get home until 2:00 in the morning. and i think my parents took that work -- they got those work shifts that those -- because my oldest sister is severely

handicapped, bonita, and they had her when they were teenager, that she would not live past eight years old. and she just recently turned 57. so my mother and father had been caring for my older sister for 57 years. it's been amazing. they are heroes in every shape, form and fashion. >> host: are the still in the house that you grew up in? yeah, absolutely. my brother remembers the old house from on the east side of moss point on rose drive. giving a shoutout to folks at home. my grandfather, i think, gave my father the land which allowed him to build the home. i'm not sure that's right. but we moved to briarwood when i first started the second or third grade. and they're still there. absolutely. picking out carpet and paint for the den right now.

>> host: i hope are in and mrs. glaude are watching and let hear from viewers now and this is neville in cleveland, you're first up with professor eddie glaude jr. >> caller: professor, i have a question. is there any aspects of african-american history which have been ignored or which do not get the attention they deserve from historians? and a final question, when you write, african-american history, who do you consider to be your audience? >> guest: thank you so much for those two questions. well, you'll know in some ways, when we think about african-american history, it is

in some ways a kind of response to the wilful ignorance of mainstream american historians. so when i think about what hunter has written about in bound in wedlock, this extraordinary book here -- i'm just reaching back to let everybody knoche the books are read, this book, do. >> host: you can hold that up if you want show it to viewers. >> guest: sure. sure. this extraordinary book here, which gives us a very different account of black marriage. of the importance of marriage in black communities, and the historical narrative about its significance and what happened which opens up this kind of political discourse about black folks, single parents and the like. and it's a very thick story with an expansive archive, and i think only someone like terra

hunter, on a person who is coming out of this particular tradition and knows this would pay attention it to. or my colleague, taylor, who wrote this extraordinary book entitled "race for profit. how banks and real estate industry undermine black home ownership ," to give us a different story about race and real estate, not just talking about racial exclusion with red lining and the like, but to talk about a kind of predatory inclusion, the way in which certain kind of approach to black home ownership allowed for certain kind of racist extraction and these are evidence of what this particular approach kind of brings into view, because i don't know if without their work, whether or not historians would have taken it up in the same way. two quick examples.

i would also say that in terms of the second question, remind me of the second question again any want to make sure i remember it. >> host: and i apologize if i'm paraphrasing it wrong but i think it was about teaching african-american history. >> guest: oh, yeah. >> host: tell you what. let's move on and -- one of us will remember. i apologize that it didn't write it down. >> guest: i apologize, too. >> host: i won't do that again. debbie in philadelphia, you're on with eddie glaude? good june, eddie glaude, eddie glaude, i think our souls are kin. you're so profound, so deliberate. i've one watching you've a while. i can't pronounce his name but

is it ten has sicoats. you're along the line of how he is to me as well. give me some idea of how you feel about the scam that is going on around the "black lives matter" vision now and the scam of the defund the police, meaning how their trying to set the narrative, and also how is your son? i remember when he wanted to go out and protest with the george floyd situation and how -- >> host: debbie we'll get answers. when. you say the scam about defund the police, what do you mean? >> caller: debbie? >> host: she's gone, sorry, professor. >> i think i have an idea what she means.

so, first of all let me just thank you for your kind words and thank you for asking about my son. he is thriving, out in california, working for the public defender service in the bay area. on his way to -- wants to be a public defender, god bless him. so i'm very proud of him. he's doing well. and he is happy, which is most important, i think. about the first question but to the scam. what she mean is this way in which "black lives matter" is being kind of scapegoated as in some ways the reason why democrats lost certain seats, the sloganeering around the police the country kind of ask -- centrist drops in conservative districts against the wall and this is the reason why folk lost and we just heard president obama recently call -- refer to it as the snappy slogan that in some ways was

antithetical to efforts to reach across or convince others to join in efforts to fundamentally reform the police. think is part ofen old frame we need to reject. that is to say, defund the police as a slogan is very -- we don't want to think of it as a slogan. it's a policy initiative that has everything to do with certain kind of claim around we budget our values. what does is mean for municipalities to spend 60% to 70% of budgets on employing and incarceration -- so part of what we have to dole with is the bad faith of these sorts of judgments of around the phrase. and then begin to understand that what folk are trying to do is so force to us debate on the terms of the old frame which is defined by law and order. so that folks can tinker around the edges but we're talking but

a fundamental transformation of how our communities are policed. we need to change that frame, and move from law and order to what i call safety and security. arch human being deserves to be safe and secure. what does that mean in detail? has everything to do with investing in social service, investing in mental health services, everything to do with investing education. walter wallace's mama in philadelphia called 9-1-1 because their baby ways having a mental episode and instead over health workers showing up police showned and 'she had to bear her baby. when we talk but defund the police that the crystallization of the argue. right there. but what instead what we're hear offing folk trying to pull us back into old graham he have tree cyst that at all costs. >> host: debbie referred to coates, the fact that he has

spend time living in paris, is that -- should we take anything significant from that? >> guest: i think that was a wonderful illusion, illusion to jimmy, between the world and me. there's this kind of moment in which he was trying to show the parallel and getting the requisite distance is important. had a different political veiling but we can talk about that some other time than what baldwin was trying to call forward, baldwin was quick to talk but what happened -- he didn't trade the american sanctitity for the french one if love that line. talks about algerians and how the french treated the algerian in their midst and the like. we don't want to trade one

sankty for -- a sank itty for another. white supremacy is across the blown and the way capitalism affects life changes. >> host: a text message for, please include your first name and your city. but this text message is, please explain the relationship between richard wright and james baldwin. >> guest: oh, it's a complicated one. my god, click -- baldwin would not be baldwin it if wasn't for richard wright. write didn't make it -- wright didn't make it through high school. another mississippi native. i can't imagine the kind of genius that evidenced itself where he willed himself to back writer, given the context of his formation. and richard wright, when bald win could barely find resources to put food in his mouth, helped him find a fellowship.

there's reason why baldwin will tell the temperature he basically turned the globe and just randomly close paris is not true. rich wright was in paris along with a vibrant expat community, and so-so many ways wright served as a kind of father figure and baldwin had to engage at least that's what he seemed to think in a kind of patricide when you read notes of a native son or alas poor richard. you can feel this complicated indebtedness. so, there's a sense in which he wanted to -- he disagreed with richard wright esthetically and that disagreement is substantive but we cannot -- we can never save that baldwin is possible without richard wright. that's how i would describe that relationship. >> host: here's a text from

angela, i's on the gulf coast, mobile, pam. how has the pandemic affected your classroom and can you sin knopp size the lectures and assigned reading for this week, assuming class is in session. >> guest: well, our semester is over. we just finished reading -- i taught a course with professor imani perry this year entitled african-american studies and the philosophy of race and we ended our semester with reading -- extraordinary novel written by someone from the gulf coast, and she -- we were delighted that justin ward attended our class, we had class threw zoom and you can't see all of them at once,

can't read their body language, the kind of performance aspect of lecturing kind of gets lost as it's mediated by this medium as it were, but i think it was successful but you can see the weariness in our students' eyes. you could see that some of them struggling by read thing papers youch can see the conditions under which hair having to write. their family, some of them are struggling with covid. it's hard. it's -- it has been hard. but students are making their way through and by the way i love mobile. it's wonderful. used to fly into mobile in order to get home back in the day. >> host: loretta in cleveland go ahead. >> caller: hi. we've been asked to reimagine america and that is a tall

order, and i'm wondering how do blacks pursue happiness and liberty without the vote? there's been a lot of voter suppression going on, and what would you suggest to rid america of institutional racism and white supremacy? and i'll take your response off the air. thank you. professor glaude? >> guest: that's a big question. so, first of all, let me just say this. hour happyness, our sense of well-being, ought not to be bound up with political reality, although though tear definitely impact -- they're definitely impacted we them. so i think rephrase the

question, it might not be about our happy unless but the question is how can we flourish as a community when we have active forces trying to suppress our vote. i've said before that black folk are kind of damned if you do, damned if you don't. i we don't vote at high numbers the nation ends up choosing someone like donald trump. when we do vote, they want to throw our votes out. the thing we have to recognize is our power. as mesh citizens -- american citizens our power to transform the country by way of our political engagement, not by just simply being herded to the polls every two and four years but understanding the power of our political organizing and really pursuing a more just america. that's the first thing. how do we transform the country?

first of all we have to tell the truth. about the country. america is so will any ignorant -- wilfullying morant because it wants to protect the innocence and doesn't want to admit that it is not the shining city on the hill. doesn't want to admit it is not an example of democracy achieved. that somehow when we talk but the wealth gap, it's not the result of black people just simply not being frugal or national to save that is correct that health gap has everything too do with policy decisions and the very moment in which the vaunted american middle class was created black folk were locked out. black folk recollection its their live thursday world war 2ing cut off from the been fit of the g.i. bills the way in which housing emerged going back to my colleague's beautiful become here, ho bloke folk were

cut out of that. so when we think but this dual labor market, how we were tracked to particular segments of the economy. the reality eave racial inequality is not the result of happen stance or some character flaw on the part of black folk. it's the result of policy so we have to the truth. pine stevenson says truth and reconciliation is sequential. first you have to tell the truth in order to reconcile. if we are going to rid ourselves of white supremacy, in this country, we have to confront, as baldwin says, our gasalier failures, and then -- in 1962 he put it even more existentially. he says we have to understand that the trouble is deeper than we wish to think because the trouble is in us. so in order to tell at the truth we have to confront the ugly unless of who we are. if that makes sense. >> host: here's a quote from begin again: black people end up having to bear the burden of compromise while white people go

on with their lives. >> guest: yeah. i remember when if wrote that sentence, it was -- i was really angry when he wrote that sentence. it's important for -- i really appreciate your pulling it out in this moment because it's important for us to hear. there's a wonderful book written by cv woodward entitle the strange career of jim crow, and woodward writes in that book -- and i'm paraphrasing deafblind black folk gained the right from a falling out among white men. now they stood to lose their right through a reconciliation between white men. so talking about the civil war, which brought about the passage of the reconstruction amendment and the 13th, 14, in, 15 in amped and then the reconciliation leads to the lost cause, jim crow, and the south,

beyond the cry miles of 1877. what do we see? we see the country doubling down only white supremacy and black folk having to bear the brunt of it. weapon we talk about compromise around the question whether or not we'll still have a society pred tate con obelieve that white people matter more than others we have to bear the brunt and i don't want my son, if he ever has children, his children to go through what he had to go through, to go through what i had to go through to do grow what my mother and father have gone through. so we bear the brunt of our attempts to shall we say reconcile with those voters who believe that we are less than. because i keep asking this question. what do the trump voter want? what do they want? what are they lamenting? why don't we delve more teachly into the world they desire? and ask ourselves, honestly do

we want to compromise with that? that's what i was trying to get at in that moment. >> host: eddie glaude, 72 million americans voted for president trump's re-election. do you have a general thought about those 72 million americans? >> guest: yeah. i do. the obvious thing is that they're number -- large number of americans who cling to the idea that america must remain a white nation in the vein of old europe. that donald trump's shenanigans and we don't want to separate trump from the republican party -- that these folk believe that the demographic shifts in the country fundamentally undermine any sense of america they're willing to be committed to. i think that's -- i also think there's other elements. not only just the fact that some

folk are racists. i think some -- there's an epidemic of selfishness and greed in country. that you have some people who could careless whether or not you're black, brown, green, yellow, only imvest enveloped their stock, only concerned but their stock portfolios, they're 401(k)s. the value in their homes, their jobs, hear civillish, given up any kind of stake in america outside of their own set of concerns, own immediate moral concern. so when you have racism, greed, you have a political class that is beholding to wall street but to others like them go are just simply about extracting, extracting, and you have folks who believe that there is --

wore all self-interested and only out in -- to pursue our only ends and that we don't have a robust conception of the public gone good when you have the three elements at work the republic is in danger, democracy itself is in danger. so when i think but the 72 plus million folks who voted for donald trump, i think but how racism, how selfishness and greed then the very foundations of american democracy itself. and it also announces the difficult task that awaits us and the biden and harris administration. >> host: eric in auburn, washington, thank you for holding. you're on with princeton professor eddie glaude. >> caller: hi. thank you. it's an honor and a privilege to speak with you, professor glaude. two things would like to bring up.

the first one is the constitution and the bible. both of these issues can be interpreted to me anything, from slavery, genocide, and we good to bible, the worst atrocity ever committed committed in the name of religion. i'm glad trump was elected president because he exposed this constitution as a racist manifesto that can be interpreted to mean anything, such as can he part him? okay, this ailes question which for legal scholars would like them to answer. if trumping part himself does that mean he can still pardon him or can he kill joe biden and pardon him? it makes no sense. you -- >> host: eric, eric, we'll leave threat. we have a lot of callers on the line, thank you for calling in. go ahead, professor. >> guest: i think eric is

outraged reflects this idea that trump believes he is above the law. he is not accountable to the law. and you have some who hold a view of the presidency, we call it imperial presidency at times, that exists outside of the framework of the law. we have heard from in the mouth of william barr ands, arguments in defense of that version or view of the executive. hear the outrage about i want to at the very clear, that's right nothing to be glad about when he wave over 270,000 dead because of trump's incompetence. when we think about the devastation to the planet, the devastation to communities, i don't believe in the idea that evil is minimum steeral to good. i don't believe in that idea. and so i want to -- i want to be

clear about the critique of how these documents, this dogma, can be molded to fit any kind of ideological end. understand that human beings are complex creature and we need to understand. the as such. ... >> host: do we spend too much time thinking about reflecting, identifying with our political leaders? >> guest: yeah, i think so. you know, i think that's such a

great question. i think so. one of few political and philosophical heroes is this fellow, baker. he figureed to e help organize in the early part of the 20th century many of the naacp chapters, was at one point in the early days the secretary of the southern christian leadership conference, opened up space to allow for the formation of the student nonviolent coordinating committee. and ms. baker, i think, had a kind of radical democratic politics where the emphasis was not so much on the leaders or those in the pulpit, right? the emphasis was on us, right? that a real vibrant i ethos carries it with the capacity of everyday, ordinary people to make a decision that will impact their lives in how they're

governed, to have a say so in the ways in which they work to make a living, to have a say so in the very fabric of the society, right? often times because we're so busy working to the bone, we want to outsource that responsibility to others. but, yeah, i i think we, you know, short answer to your question, i think we focus too much on leaders. and in doing so, we often absolve ourself of the respondent that democracy requires -- the responsibility that democracy requires. >> host: paul's in johnstown, pennsylvania, and he posts on our facebook page, if you could meet james baldwin, what would you ask him? >> guest: oh, my god. if i could meet jimmy, what would i ask him? oh, there's so many questions that just came flooding, flooding through. well, you know, there's a selfish question about just the writing. i would, we would have to have a conversation about craft.

how do you get the ideas in your head on the page. how do you find the time when everybody's pulling on you, right? to get to the page, to write and craft the stories that are running around in your head. how do you do that when it seems that you have become the possession of others. that's oneselfish question. one selfish question. another question, from whence is courage. you know, this vulnerable, queer black man or gay black man, bayard rustin said when jimmy would walk on the stage when speaking, he he would literally be shaking. he didn't understand, didn't know how he you are survived it all, he was so intense. baldwin was emotionally fragile but courageous, you know?

and i have been trying to prove to myself that i'm courageous ever since i was a little cud. and i would have to talk -- little kid. i would have to talk with him about that. if that makes sense. >> host: what do you mean when you say you've been trying to prove it to yourself? >> guest: so i mentioned, and, you know, this is awkward, because i know my dad is watching. i mentioned that my dad could scare you with a stare. and he deposited in me early on a kind of fear that resided in the gut. and i've been trying to prove to myself that i'm not afraid. and i'm being honest in this moment, right? and i think baldwin helped me do this because i remember being stuck in the writing, and so i just picked up jimmy if started

reading him again. there was this kind of insistence that, you know, before you can say anything about the country, you're going to have to deal with you. you're going to have to deal with the fact that you're this vulnerable little boy. and i think, you know, that line came out, it jumped out at me, you know? when you're afraid, you don't run from the fear, you run towards it. you run toward it. and so i think, you know, grappling with who i am and a all of that complexity, you know, it freed me up to write the sentences that you're reading. so, yeah, yeah, that's what i mean. >> host: text message, this is gladys and greg, robert langley's sister and brother-in-law -- [laughter] what would baldwin say in this moment in time, and they're from camden, arkansas. somebody you know? >> guest: yeah, it's my neighbor. [laughter]

that's really beautiful. i've never tried to anticipate baldwin's words. that's the kind of hubris that i've tried to resist. you know, there were 7,000 pages of work, so, you know, i don't want to suggest what he might saw. what i know -- what he might say. what i know to be true is that, you know, we have to tell the truth about who we are. and about what we've done in order to release ourselves into a different way of being in the world. you know, i remember as i was trying to write the book, and i can just remember this in 206, right? and -- 2016, and i just can't saying to myself, damn, they've done it again. look at this. these folk have done it again. right? and in trying to figure out how to bear witness to what that meant in its detail.

and so part of the work that we have to do, i think, in this moment that you and i must do, right, is to detail the choice and its consequences. to not, to not gloss over what we're seeing, to name the hatred for what it is, to name the selfishness for what it is, right? to really not allow are america to retreat into delusions and its comfort, right? that's what we would have to do. and what that's going to look like will look different whether you're arguing around a living wage, whether you're arguing for medicare for all, whether you're pushing for an education system or that's fair and just, you're pushing for criminal justice reform whatever with might mean by that phrase, right? we have to tell the truth about what we've done. that's the precondition for being released into being

otherwise. and that, to me, is a basic baldwin insight that i take from the ruins, as he described his work, yeah. >> host: well, i think la payton is our new -- sheila payton is our new heroine. the second question was when dr. glaude writes a book, who is the audience he ising writing to? >> guest: that's great. yes, thank you. thank you so much for that. see what the demos can do? we can lift each other up, right? that's wonderful. so the audience, it varies. so the early books the audience, right, very narrow, right? when you read exodus or in a shade of blue or you look at the edited volumes is it nation time or african-american religious thought, it's a narrow kind of academic community. the arc of those books though is

toward a broader community. in the shade of blue, for example, was written while i was on tour with tavis smiley for the koh significant for black -- covenant for black america book expect old state of the black union convention, you know, gatherings we used to have, that c-span used to air, right? but, you know, so one audience is kind of narrow, professional, right? the other audience is my mama. i remember when i first published exodus, she said, well, i couldn't get past chapter three, or something like that. you know? so the idea is to write with a level of clarity that allows her to access the ideas and to, you know, to be automobile to engage with what i'm doing, right? so, you know, i always tell folk my mama is the center of my

moral gravity, so whenever i feel like i'm moving off center, i think about her, and she -- i can recalibrate, i can get back straight, you know? i'm a mama's boy in some ways. so she's, she is the kind of generalized audience. but at the end of the day, e try to write -- i try to write the book, as toni morrison would say, that i want to read. so i'm writing for me too, if that makes sense. but that's three different kinds of -- thank you for reminding us of that question, thank you. >> host: norma's in littleton, colorado. and you're on with princeton professor eddie glaude. >> caller: yes. i was wondering if professor ghawd was aware of a statement that mitch mcconnell made six weeks after obama took office, and i hope i can get this out, because it's so upsetting. mitch mcconnell said on tv

that the republican plan was to destroy the obama presidency. his exact words. they're just burned into my brain, and i thought it was treason, and nobody said anything. it wasn't covered in the news or anything, and it's -- the only thing i can think of maybe president obama heard it and couldn't believe that he couldn't find a way to work with the republicans. and it's just been modified and said, oh, make him a one-term president and so forth, and he won't work with us. and then some years later i was channel surfing, there was a panel where a man said that on january 20, 2009 during the inauguration festivities for president obama, remoneys including paul ryan and mitch mcconnell and other leaders came up with that plan to

destroy the obama presidency. and it's amazing that he could do what he could do, and that's -- >> host: all right, norma in littleton, colorado, i think we got the point. eddie glaude, your comments on that. >> guest: yeah, i mean, we don't want to be naive, and that is we need to understand mitch mcconnell for who he is. and mitch mcconnell has been one of the -- a self-interested actor who has participated not only in, in my view, the destruction of this body called the senate, but he has been a central, central force in eroding the basic foundations of american democracy. obama unleashed all sorts of anxiety, right? his election, right? i mean, ooh people talked about the tea party being a result of economic anxiety, but, you know, the social science data showed that that economic anxiety was

driven by de-racial anxiety. we know that over the course of his eight years in office, those demographic shifts spiked in interesting sorts of ways, and we saw the intensity of the spread of deep white resentment, white grievance and white hatred mobilized not only by the tea party, but that resulted in the election of donald trump, but also mobile used by the like of mitch mcconnell. so obama, president obama can become an interesting -- [inaudible] but a point of entry to understand the depth of what some might call the backlash or the betrayal the. and mitch mcconnell's voicing of that, in that moment, to destroy, you know, the obama presidency, or to make him a one-term president announced very clearly a political and policy agenda. that resulted in, in part, trumpism.

right? this is what -- so we can't disentangle the two, in my mind, that these are intimately related. is i appreciate your passion, but not -- not even but, i appreciate your passion. let's understand it for what it is. >> host: pastor willie dean of atlanta texts in to you, dr. glawld, as a scholar of religion, what is your take on the division of the church split between -- pardon me -- split between democratic and republican camps? what do you see as the role of the church and its future? >> yeah. you know -- [laughter] frederick douglass said that the church steeple was right next to the slave auction block. american christiandom has always been shadowed by the holistic contradiction of slavery and white supremacy. african-american christianity in some ways comes into existence

as the great theologian put it, in the part to -- [inaudible] profane in its midst, to understand white christianity citizen a form -- as a form of idolatry. not only impacted the way in which one experienced communion, the way in which one worshiped, you had the, quote-unquote, inward pews where black people had to go, right? the civil war happened in american christiandom before one bullet was fired. and now we see, fast forward into today, that in 2020 white evangelicals supported donald trump at extraordinary numbers even with four years of evidence of incompetence, of mendacity and corruption and greed. and so what i think we need is to give vows to a much more prophetic -- voice to a much more prophetic understanding of the gospel.

and this is why i always turn to bishop reverend william barber at the poor people's campaign and what he's trying to put forward. and that is an argument on christian grounds for a more just america. so part of what the short answer to the question that what we're seeing are the kinds of historical divisions that have always been a part of the very dna of american christiandom make themselves known in our current moment. and with we need to just simply be honest about that. >> host: 202 is the area code, 748-8200 in the east and central time zones. 202-748-8201 if you live in the mountain and pacific time zones, and you can send a text message to eddie glaude as well, 202-748-8903. if you do send a text, please include your first name and your city. we've got about 45 minutes left with author eddie glaude.

roy's in washington. roy, you're on booktv. >> caller: hello, dr. glaude. it's really great to talk with you this morning, at least listen to you. my question relates to strategies and position keepers and so on. you and other academics are very good explainers, and i appreciate that, you know? filling the history up. but what about your influence and impact on political organizations like the naacp, the civil right groups? are they listening to you, and are they forming strategies, and are you giving them guidance so that they can do their work to better the african-american community at large? because i know it's questionable how well they've done it to date. >> guest: thank you for your question. you know, i'm not so sure if they need to listen to me. [laughter]

but i think there is, there are moments of connection between what we do in the academic world and what folks do in the policy world. these, the lines or the boundaries between these two worlds blur every now and then. you know, there is in america a deep suspicion of academics, you know? richard of stetter wrote anti-intellectualism in america. we're often characterized as those folks locked in the ivory tower who have no sense of how power moves and operates. but that's just a kind of generalization. i think on the ground there are efforts to reach across these boundaries. i know what i've been trying to do with my own work is to write for a broader a -- audience. i'm not a policy guy, i think it's in moral or ethical terms.

so my task is to try to figure out how to put forward a set of values that may drive how we think about policy. how might i offer a description of the current set of problems, offer languages to describe those problems that will reorient us, that will give us a different angle on the problems we face. and so, you know, i find myself at times talking with representative hakeem jeffries or having conversations we've rend william barber who's an intellectual in every sense of the world. or, you know, sitting down and talking with folk across policy think tanks and the like. so short answer to the question, it's happening. it's uneven but it's happening. >> host: from democracy in black from 2016, professor glaude writes: when i teach introduction to african-american studies at princeton, i always begin with a quotation from alexis de tocqueville from the classic democracy in america.

tocqueville helps me hay out the -- lay out the space. what is that quote in. >> it's coming from the chapter on the three races where he says now that i've talked about -- now that i leave matters of democracy behind, i will turn to -- [inaudible] that's a paraphrase. and in some ways, this is the most insightful work we have on american democracy. and de tocqueville, you know, my colleague, melvin rogers, would take issue with this, but i think i'm right. he in some ways separates the two issues. i dealt with the issue of democracy, now i'm going to turn to the issue of race. to my mind, race is at the heart of how we think about democracy in this country. this is what makes jimmy baldwin so important. i think he is perhaps the most insightful critic we have about american democracy and race. he's the inheritor of ralph waldo emerson. he takes emerson across the tracks in some ways and offers

us a different understanding of who we think of ourselves to be american. when you take an african-american studies class, you're not ghettoizing the subject matter. we're not kind of locked in this silo of identity matters, right? when we think about the issue of race, we're thinking at the hart of the democratic -- at the heart of the democratic project itself, right? and more importantly, and perhaps this has to be emphasized, is when you take this class in this moment, right, you're gaining access to a particular vantage point of what it means to be human. just as when you're reading russian literature or you're reading irish literature and you don't get the jokes, i don't get the jokes, but i understand there's something about the writing that says something about what it means for me to be a human being in the world. so the same thing i'm trying to do in this moment by telling my

students you're in this class and, guess what? by thinking about race in the way in which we're doing, we're at the heart of this fragile experiment in democracy. you at the heart of the matter. so don't think about this as just coming in here to feel good about yourself or a pat yourself on the back about your virtue. we're about to get busy.half. >> host: professor glaude -- [laughter] professor glaude, wasn't james baldwin criticized as being a hypocrite because he had an affinity for white men? >> guest: that's wrong as two left feet. that ease crazy. -- that's crazy. you love who you love. this is literally how we respond to the folks talking about -- [inaudible] it's a book about love. it's not just -- you love who you love, right? and when we allow these cat gores -- categories, right, to overdetermine the heart, right,

to blind or to block one's self off to the beauty of another human being, then you open yourself up to becoming as monstrous as the folks that we're fighting. so i find that to be -- [inaudible] >> host: ken santoro, facebook post. dr. glaude, evangelism of black victimization based on an indictment that there is systematic racism in the u.s. if it is so pervasive, how do you measure something like that? if it is the unequal economic aachievement of blacks, how do you explain the high achievement levels of asian-americans? isn't the problem black culture, not valuing strong nuclear families or the importance of education? >> guest: you know, so it's just wonderful to have this question because it becomes exhibit a of the problem. so part of the challenge for us in this moment of how do we

imagine ourselves otherwise that we have to deal with the discord that absolves the country of its guilt. so the problem, can you imagine what's at the heart of that formulation? the condition of black folk in this country is, in fact, a result of their bad choices. in order for that to make sense empirically, you would have to hold the view that millions of black people are making bad decisions generationally over time every single day. that makes no sense. remember i just said earlier we have to tell the truth. we have to tell the truth about how the wealth gap happened. we have to tell the truth about the ways in which, right, policy has generateed racial inequal ity in this country. -- inequality e in this country. instead, what we hear in response is the ideology of the lost cause. that there in formulation has, in some ways, its origins in the

kinds of arguments used to defend, right, the lost cause in interesting sorts of ways. so how do i respond to that argument? first of all, we have to just simply say that it's nonsense, it's silly, right? on a certain level are, right in and then on the other hand, we need to go to the um peer call -- empirical evidence that they refuse to acknowledge. so no matter what we do, no matter what black folk do on our own, we never close the gap, the awe achievement gap in terms of the divisions within education. no matter how much money we save in this moment, we will have -- it will be almost impossible without direct policy intervention to chose the wealth gap. to close the wealth gap. and this is all the result of policies. now, let's just be very, very clear. youd asked me about my parents. hmm? and, you know, my parents didn't grow up in slavery. they're not that old. [laughter]

the nation, the last piece of major legislation designed to address deep systemic racism was the fair housing act of 1968, deeply flawed in its implementation. just 12 years later reagan was elected to undo it all. america didn't become a genuine democracy until 1965 with the passage of the voting rights act. i was born in 1968. my parents came of age in a country designed to reproduce advantage for white folk and disadvantage for those who were not. and to deny it is to become complicit in that. that's not to say that black folk are absolved of responsibility. that's not to absolve us of making bad choices because we're human beings, after all, we do. but you've got to tell the truth. and i can tell you right now that that position is not necessarily held by a loud racist. that position that you just read

is not someone who walks around perhaps with, you know, declaring that he's a member of the kkk. that position is being held by are republicans and some democrats alike, right? and that's what we have to address as clearly as we can and with passion. and if folk don't want to listen, we continue to try to build a just america that reflects the truth. >> host: professor glaude, do conservative students, self-identified conservative students, take your classes? >> guest: i think so, some do. but most times my courses are self-selecting. so i hope they do. we could have the kind of exchanges that i think the best of education makes possible. yeah. >> host: professor glawld got

his b.a. in political science from morehouse college, his master's from temple and his ph.d. in religion from princeton. he chairs the african-american studies department at princeton. he's taught there since 2002, and he is the author of six books, and we've got about another half hour with him here on booktv. [laughter] richard in hyattsville, maryland, please go ahead with your question or comment. >> caller: good afternoon, question e men. first and foremost, peter, a chance to tell you at the book festival that you're one of the best interviewers in the business, so keep up the good work. for mr. glaude, you opened up with donald trump and are we going to go to a better place or double down on the past. the speech that he gave in valdosta reminded me of reagan down in mississippi, it was very divisive, and we know where we've gone since then. i would just like to know if you've ever had a conversation with mr. coats as you both being

contemporaries of mr. baldwin and how did it go. and lastly, the statement you made about mr. obama, and you said you took some heat from it, it was a very pertinent statement that should have been made. it could have been a little bit strong the because you had to see him through the lens of a kenyan-american, not an frum because he did not -- african-american because he did not associate himself with slavery. and so he had hopes and aspirations of making it onto that great white boat with his oar to -- [inaudible] and step away from husband mixed past or presentage. and last -- parentage. and lastly, i think that going forward you said on "morning joe" one time we're going to go to a darker place. i think that stands. and during the primaries joe biden reminded me of woodrow wilson as a person who has a

coalition from w.e.b. dubois and all those other great people of that time. and then when he got into his presidency, he and his wife conspired, they brought about separation of dining facilities, internal offices and the whole -- >> host: you know what, richard? we're going to leave it therement we've got four topics on the board, president trump, ta'nehisi coates, president obama and a darker place. >> guest: yeah, so what donald trump did last night is very dangerous. we, i don't think we've faced as a republic this sort of challenge with regards to the transition, peaceful transition of power in this way. ..

that does not bode well to how we will move forward. then we will get to that when we get to the darker place. last night it's concrete evidence of the danger the clear and present danger that trump presents and enablers present to the republic. in terms of reverend coates, we've had a brief conversation in passing online and by email but we've never really sat down and talked. i think we have a different politics, that would be an interesting conversation to have i think, about how we think about black culture and

black politics. it would be interesting. that's the short answer, in terms of obama, i don't like to talk about obama in terms of his identity and his politics. i don't want to attribute to him decisions that flow from ã ãmy disagreements with barack obama our principal and political. to me he is a third way democrat, he's a centrist liberal. i don't think, i'm willing to have an argument about it i don't think that clinton is ãb i would go far to say that the third way democrat contributed to the environment that produced donald trump himself.

and we can have that argument. in terms of the last point, let me get to this really quickly. we been talking about me being from the gulf coast, i'm from the coast, as a result i been through a few hurricanes. what is so interesting about hurricanes the front end of the hurricane's fear, danger, then you get the calm of the eye and during the eye of the storm i remember my dad walking out of the house assessing damage, looking at what's there, what's happening, then you know the tail is coming. the tail is as fierce as the front and. we are in the eye of the store. the tail is coming. the tail is coming. >> patricia, buffalo, please go ahead. >> my question is, do you have a position on reparations and

did james baldwin have a position of reparations. i believe we are old reparations, that's my question, thank you for taking it. >> guest: thank you for the question. i believe in reparations but it depends on what form it takes. operation can take a number of different forms. part of what i've been arguing is that we need to understand racial inequality, racial injustice, as a result of policy decisions. and that the remedy will have to be driven by politics. of course there is a moral and ethical set of commitments that come with it but in order to genuinely remedy racial injustice as a country we have to have policy decisions that speak directly to the inequality. there is nothing black people can do individually to close the achievement gap or close the wealth gap, it's good have

to be a much more concerted collective effort to do that. that can fall under the recourse of ãbdiscourse of reparation. it's all sequential, first ever tell the truth, then reconcile, then repair. if we don't tell the truth, then the reconciliation will be on shaky ground and repair will never evidence in self in any substantive or long-term sense. that's how i would respond to that. >> the next call for professor eddie glaude comes from karen, karen is in detroit. >> caller: good afternoon, thank you for taking my call, professor glaude, i enjoy hearing you speak on various news shows, my question is this, what were the factors that led to the formation of the african-american studies program at princeton university?

i know during the 1970s a lot of african-american studies programs were formed, i was present at the formation of the one at indiana university, i was curious what you think were the factors that led to the formation and how well have those programs been sustained over the years? >> guest: african american studies at ythi t with student to do with these institutions feeling the pressure of mass protests during the 1960s, 1967, 1968, it has every thing movements making their way to campuses. you might talk about this having everything to do with free speech out of berkeley but you think about what happened in san francisco state, what happened at yale, what happened at cornell, as universities and colleges are beginning to open its doors to black and brown folk and women they begin to experience pressure and these new constituencies begin to demand of universities, spaces

and add curriculum that reflect the complex experiences of human life that it's not just simply about old white men or particular western and the diff kinds of institutional configurations of black studies across the country, some become programs, some become centers, some become departments and the like. princeton is late in the game. our department of african studies is very young. we just graduated our first cohort of bas and african american studies just a few years ago. it had everything to do with the black lives matter movement and how it evidenced itself on our campus with black and brown and diverse student bodies. and allies, holding the university accountable. demanding that the university in some ways catch up and it's in that context that after american studies came into existence. >> host: to follow up on that, here is a text from juanita

mitchell, a member of the princeton theological soma seminary, why didn't they name the woodrow wilson school at princeton after michelle obama instead of melody?>> guest: they didn't name the woodrow wilson school after melody hobson, the woodrow wilson, one of the residential halls has been named after melanie hobbs. i'm not invested in who they name it after in that sense. i just want the built-in to reflect the diversity of the world we live in. that's what's important. we will see what happens, how the school eventually celebrates its alumni, michelle obama, we will see what happens over the course of the coming years. >> host: we've gotten a couple along this line, a couple of texts, this is tina in bethesda maryland, which one work by james baldwin would you most recommend people read?

>> guest: all my lord ãboh, my lord, that is so hard. i could cheat and say this is what the library ãbthat collection i think it needs to be redone so that it includes the evidence of things not seen, which is baldwin's last book published in 1987 about the atlanta murders. but the spine of "begin again" is "no name in the street. i often teach no name in the street alongside of his ãband focusing on his nonfiction. no name in the street is so important for me because it's the first book he publishes after the assassination of king

and it's a very vulnerable place. he's trying to grapple with the country's betrayal. if "no name in the street" is the reckoning i think you delve into that book at the level of form and substance it will open up, i think, baldwin's later work in ways that are just fascinating. it's an important book at the level of content but also an important book at the level of formal innovation that will help you understand what he is doing in his fiction and subsequent nonfiction work later on. >> host: i've got that library series of baldwin's work and i've just finished the early books. those aren't edited in any way, are they? when they are in the library. >> guest: fulltext.

and that addition, the editor is tony morris. who said they found language and baldwin's probe it's beautiful. >> host: we always asked our guests on in-depth what their favorite books are and what they are reading, here were professor glaude's answers. james baldwin "the fire next time" and "no name in the street" are the two, gabriella garcia martin, 100 years of solitude ãband sarah broome, the yellow house. currently reading jasmine ward "saying unburied saying" natasha korecki away "memorial drive" "the debtor arising: the life of malcolm x" " consciousness is harness the flesh" and "the heart of

darkness" any of those books you want to add dimension to? >> guest: i love sarah broome's the yellow house. just to connect it to the gulf coast. she's from new orleans. new orleans is always the big city, it's always over there, with us country folk. at the level of structure is an absolutely gorgeous but. it's beautifully written. it's a memoir but it so much more than that. and how this house is the metaphor is just a beautiful book. it's a beautiful but. i think it's important for me to reach for contemporary writers because often times we find ourselves looking back to the giants and thinking that we are just empty facts to know that we can't stand in a kind

of differential relationship to the writers of the past, like i didn't record book about jimmy baldwin, i wrote with him. i want to lift up sarah broome and imani perry, and others who are doing something extraordinary work at the time. i'm reading joph i have to get better before i let everyone read it because it's so bad. >> host: hidden there in the office. >> guest: buried in the midst of the mess that only i know where it is. eventually one of these days i have a story about my grandmother that's in my head. someone who lost her children to suicide and then lost her memory to all summers it's the

kernel of an amazing story. i've got to become a better writer in order to manage it. >> host: "begin again" reads a little like a sermon, is that a fair analysis? >> guest: it has elements of the black homiletic tradition. i think it's this eloquent ãb that i'm comfortable in. even though i come out of the joseph black tradition, i've heard the best black preaching in the world at morehouse. of course when you read ãbyou not only hear the language of henry james and marcel preuss and others, you hear the language of the king james bible, you hear the language of the church, of the black

church. you can't help but have those moments evidenced. >> host: i want to acknowledge thaddeus in newport news, his text saying that his favorite writing by james baldwin is "no name in the street". richard is in little rock arkansas, go ahead richard. >> caller: professor, i would like to hear you talk briefly about how students value education, and particular give it some historical context how they valued it in the past compared to today. whatever, just talk a bit about that, thank you. >> guest: it's hard to say. i don't want to do pollyanna about it. there are some students who come to education instrumentally, i need to get this because i want to do this and get that. education is a means to an end.

we see across higher education and assaults on the humanity, and assault on the disciplines that are not vehicles for making money, vehicles to a kind of profession. you have some students who approach education transactionally. then you have folks who are just genuinely inquisitive, their curiosity drives them. they are reaching for ways of seeing, new ways of seeing and knowing that makes them more expansive. they are actually trying to get the keys to the universes library and their curiosity is so infectious. as we make our way through books, i just had a student this semester, the first paper was full of all of this unnecessary jargon, i was like

do you talk like this? she was like, no. we worked our way through it. the revised version of the paper was just beautiful and brilliant. that openness to grow, i think there is transaction and then curiosity and then there are those folks, this is only anãb only analytical, who understand their lives as a campus upon which they can create art. they are engaged in the arguments task of self creation. so education becomes a critical moment of character formation the germans were called ã they are invested because they are engaged in this extraordinary effort of

creating that extends beyond their own provincial background or parochial beginning. that's why i love the hell out of what i do. >> host: richard is in little rock arkansas, hi, richard. >> caller: i'm a little confused because i was listening on my phone. what i was talking about do today's professors have kids who listen to their cell phone during class. it seems to be degrading how they value education, seems to be going downward. >> guest: i wouldn't make that generalization. technology is always impacted how folks learn. technological innovations change the way you learn math when you get a calculator. i remember we had to move those things across because remember those little marbles he moved across when you were young, now students these babies are growing up with these things in

their hands and brains are wired different. of course it makes it more challenging as a professor to keep their attention because they are behind a computer screen and could be checking emails or looking at tik tok or instagram or whatever, that is happening but i don't want to draw conclusion from the technological advances that somehow they value education less. i don't want to draw that conclusion just yet. >> host: in a larger sense, is higher education particularly going to be changing even more radically in the next five years because of technology? because of the information that is available? >> guest: that's always that has been a part of the transformation as we see digital humanities and a range of other shifts and changes in the landscape, i think more

than anything covid, covid changes the periodization of our lives. there was pre-covid and there will be post covid. the landscape of higher averag education will be fundamentally different post covid. having everything to do with resource disparity, having everything to do with how these critical platforms change the way in which we interact with our students and the way which we use market language in a way which universities deliver products to students. i think technology will have an impact as universities and colleges try to figure out how to fulfill their mission in a post covid world. >> host: let's hear from karen in atlanta, hi, karen. >> caller: hi!

doctor glaude, first let me say thank you because you are with us at the people of color conference this week and you are amazing. actually led the book discussion on friday. which had 500 people packed in there. there is one lingering question that those of us, especially people of color, working in independent schools were really grappling with we wanted to know where ãbwhat is your stance in regard to this after time we find ourselves in particularly as it relates to our white colleagues who many of them from the first time excited and ready to "do the work " but really still looking to us to sort of i guess carry them through that.

if that makes any sense. >> host: we will get an answer in just a minute, toss very quickly about yourself. >> i am the chief diversity equity and inclusion officer at the galloway school in atlanta. i work for an ais in the summer with pure line blackwell our vice president of our national association of independent schools so we had doctor glaude, who delivered the most amazing keynote opening address to us this week. and then also followed up with a very brief discussion on his book and have already started making plans to hopefully do an eight or nine part series because there is just so much interest at it so relevant to what we do. but we are struggling because we know how baldwin felt at the end, we were all po tc is our elsewhere. >> host: karen, what is the

galloway school? >> caller: galloway is the only school in atlanta that actually accepted doctor martin luther king children and was founded on the principles of social justice and i have just been hired, for the first time, the school was founded in 1969, i have just been hired to be the school's first chief diversity equity and inclusion officer. >> host: thank you very much, we have to leave it there, professor glaude, "after time" is a phrase you use in "begin again". >> guest: i actually get the phrase from walt whitman's democratic ãthis is that moment as one world comes crashing down a new world is trying to be born and we find ourselves in the between space. whitman was worrying about what the gilded age met for american democracy and here we are.

the question is fascinating, i'm always asked the question by fellow white american citizens, what can i do to help? sometimes it gets frustrating because you think, i have to bear the burden ãbso the first thing i typically say is that we have to shift our frame from viewing racial justice as it charitable or philanthropic enterprise present racial justice is not yours to give anybody, you don't possess us, racial equality is not yours to give anybody come you don't possess it. we have to build a different way of approaching how we build a more just world. that last formulation opens up to an answer to the question, whenever "what can i do next?" we have to respond to what is your perception of a more just way? baldwin said this all the time, what else does the negro want?

he would raise the hackles on his neck.whenever he had a question, you know they're not thinking of us as human beings. because we want the same things as every other human being. do you believe if you work 40 hours a week you should be able to put food on the table and keep a roof over your head. if you do then fight for minimum wage, ãbif you believe that nobody should go broke because they are sick, then join the fight for health care for all. what is your conception of a just world? if you answer that question honestly you're going to find yourself right dab square in the middle of racial injustice in this country. so part of the task for us is to ask our fellows, make a choice, choose what you can a

person who happens to be white or even to be a white person. baldwin makes that distinction. in "the evidence of things not seen ". he said i happen to love a lot of people who are white ãbthere are those folks who engage in the ongoing integration of how race distributes advantage and disadvantages ãbthey are working hard to create a more just world peace within our folks were committed to the idea that advantage and disadvantage should be distributed on the line of who is valued and who is left out. where you going to stand? choose and then act on it. and then let's act together to build a more just world.>> host: have you considered running for office? >> guest: no, no. >> host: why? >> guest: i'm free. i love what i do. i'm in the classroom.

i revel in the life of the mind. i get to interact with these amazing students every year. i get paid to read, write, and run my mouth, the three favorite things i love to do. >> host: text message to you, as time passes we understand historical figures better and differently, is there anyone you have changed your mind about? >> guest: ask about again? >> host: as time passes we understand historical figures better and differently, is there anyone you personally have changed your mind about in history? >> guest: ã >> host: you think about that for a minute. that's an on the spot question. let's go back to phones.

>> guest: whitman. there's one moment after reading his editorials, i saw him as blatant racist, hypocrite but then i had to figure out how i could come back to him. and i did. and ãbwas one of my favorite books. >> host: yolanda in denver. >> caller: doctor glaude, this is about obama's latest book and i was disappointed that in the light of the destruction of our attempts to 20% of black america's ancestors that this chaos and terrorism and this happened after the destruction of the nubian government by obama and he seemed to express pride in what he did to destroy

the libyan government. >> host: we are out of time, what specifically is your question? >> caller: i was wondering if you had any kind of opinion about obama continuing to be proud of what he did ã >> host: i will finish with a quote, this is from democracy in black "in 2008 and again 2012, obama sold black america, the snake oil of hope and change, he joined bill clinton and jimmy carter, other confidence men who presented themselves as people who would challenge the racial order of things ". >> guest: i know we are running short on time, i'm gonna fall back on my southern roots, going back to ãbwhen i think about president obama now the only thing that comes to mind is that we been there and done that. been there and done that. >> host:, the author of six

books, his most recent just published this year "begin again", james baldwin's america and its urgent lessons for our own, we appreciate your spending two hours with us from princeton. >> guest: thank you. >> host: any of this in-depth program re-airs right now. oh. >> up next, booktv monthly in-depth program with author and princeton university professor eddie glaude, his