Synopses & Reviews
From the author of the New York Times bestseller So You Want to Talk About Race, a subversive history of white male American identity.
What happens to a country that tells generation after generation
of white men that they deserve power? What happens when success is
defined by status over women and people of color, instead of by actual
accomplishments?
Through the last 150 years of American history — from the
post-reconstruction South and the mythic stories of cowboys in the West,
to the present-day controversy over NFL protests and the backlash
against the rise of women in politics — Ijeoma Oluo exposes the
devastating consequences of white male supremacy on women, people of
color, and white men themselves.
Mediocre investigates the real costs of this phenomenon in order to imagine a new white male identity, one free from racism and sexism.
As provocative as it is essential, this book will upend
everything you thought you knew about American identity and offers a
bold new vision of American greatness.
Review
"Nuanced, uncomfortable, and illuminating." Washington Post
Review
"Oluo is one of our great voices and
Mediocre not only educates us, but it inspires us all to act and
change the world for the better. But first, I need to read this book
again. It's just that damn good." Phoebe Robinson, New York Times bestselling author of You Can't Touch My Hair
Review
"Mediocre offers profound truth in service of liberation. It cuts
to the heart of white male supremacy, a system that is life-destroying
for people of color and even for white men ourselves." Matt McGorry, Actor, How To Get Away With Murder and Orange is the New Black, Activist, and Co-Founder of Inspire Justice
About the Author
Ijeoma Oluo is the author of the
New York Times bestseller
So You Want to Talk About Race. Her work on race has been featured in the
New York Times and the
Washington Post. She has twice been named to the
Root 100,
and she received the 2018 Feminist Humanist Award from the American Humanist Association. She lives in Seattle, Washington.