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World To Come: The Baltimore Uprising, Militant Racism, and History
Katherine Bankole-Medina, author
This essay collection, World to Come: Essays on the Baltimore Uprising, Militant Racism, and History, addresses the 2015 Baltimore protests and riots over the death of Freddie Gray. The main purpose of this compilation is to critically explore the historical moment surrounding the 2015 Baltimore Uprising and the death of Freddie Gray (excluding the court cases of the Baltimore 6—the police officers involved). The manuscript makes a unique contribution to several fields: African American history, African American studies, Africology, historical criticism, and critical race theory. A minor concern was documenting and critiquing the 2015 Baltimore Uprising excluding the litigation. This was resolved by firmly situating the manuscript in the protest event and immediate aftermath (April—December 2015); and briefly noting the significance of the pending litigation. This manuscript is compelling because it was written from the perspective of those most affected by fatal police-encounters in the United States—African Americans who question and dispute this police action. The work is timely because it focuses on the importance of history, issues of race, racism, encounters with law enforcement, the media, the Black Lives Matter movement, and uses interdisciplinary sources (and theories) too often overlooked. The manuscript is 450 pages (with 500+ citations), contains a preface, a forward by Dr. Reiland Rabaka (University of Colorado at Boulder), 15 chapters (each with an epigraph), an epilogue, an extensive appendix (A Timeline of the 2015 Baltimore Uprising, Baltimore Uprising Protest Signs, A Compendium of African Americans Who Died In Police-Encounters, 1994-2015, Grand Jury Charges Against The Baltimore 6, May 21, 2015, Domestic Riot/Civil Disobedience and Protest Events Related to Race in the United States, 1863-2015), and a general index.
Reviews
Bankole-Medina, a professor of history at Coppin State University, uses her participation in and chronicling of the Black Lives Matter movement to provide necessary perspective on the Baltimore uprising in the spring of 2015 following the death of Freddie Gray in police custody. Her series of essays draws upon history and political theory, and is informed by aspects of popular culture. This dual perspective is simultaneously problematic and fruitful: the book lacks the clear focus and objective tone that would be expected of a work of academic scholarship, but Bankole-Medina is able to situate Gray’s death and the resultant protest movement within a long and multifaceted history of African-American activism, the militarization of American policing, and race-based urban unrest. Bankole-Medina is not and does not pretend to be a neutral observer of American racial politics, and the “world to come” of her optimistic title is one that will be “free from anti-black racism.” Anyone curious about the longstanding social tensions that suffuse America’s cities and the particular responses of Baltimore’s residents, politicians, and law enforcement officials will find much here to think long, deep, and hard about. (BookLife)
News
03/29/2016
Dr. Bankole-Medina's contact email
Dr. Bankole-Medina can be contacted at drbankolemedina@gmail.com
03/30/2016
Indy Start-up Press Signs World To Come for First Run
Independent small press start-up, Liberated Scholars' Association Press (in a partnership with AP Foundation Press, Washington, D.C.) has agreed to print the first run of Dr. Bankole-Medina's book, World To Come: The Baltimore Uprising, Militant Racism, and History.
