Social Justice Books

Critically reviewed selection of multicultural and social justice books for children, young adults, and educators.

Baghdad Burning: Girl Blog from Iraq

Reviewed by Rethinking Schools Book Author: “The trouble with world history is it started so long ago,” I complained to anyone who would listen as I wrestled with the best way to start the year for my 10th-grade World History students. In their first journal entries, many of my students had already told me they thought […]

Portraits of Racial Justice: Americans Who Tell the Truth

Reviewed by Rethinking Schools Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: In his preface to Portraits of Racial Justice, Robert Shetterly describes his new volume as “an art book, a history book, a curriculum, a manifesto. It is a community of people unafraid to name the failures of this country and the injustices of power that benefit […]

Lessons in Liberation: An Abolitionist Toolkit for Educators

Reviewed by Rethinking Schools Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author:  Lessons in Liber­ation successfully sets out to answer a critical question: What does aboli­tionist education look like in practice? Lessons in Libera­tion pulls together a stunning mix of background articles and teaching ideas, all aimed at being useful for educators and community activists interested in […]

Celebrate People’s History: The Poster Book of Resistance and Revolution

Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: It’s easy to lose oneself in this rich collection of more than 100 posters edited by Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative member Josh MacPhee. The beautiful posters, representing a range of artists and events in U.S. and world history, were originally posted in public spaces to counter the “endless barrage of […]

We Still Here: Pandemic, Policing, Protest, and Possibility

Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: Marc Lamont Hill’s newest book is small and urgent. Focused on the racist roots of the 2020 pandemic and uprising, it is a book about right now, written right now. Hill writes, “It’s not enough just to recount the things that have happened in this crazy year of 2020. […]

Black Lives Matter at School: An Uprising for Educational Justice

Review Source: Rethinking Schools Book Author: This essential handbook offers a cornucopia of stories, strategies, campaigns, and lessons for making Black lives matter at school. Denisha Jones, early childhood educator and Sarah Lawrence College professor, and Seattle teacher and Rethinking Schools editor Jesse Hagopian are not distant editors picking and choosing readings from afar. They […]