History; in the Service of Solidarity
Michael Ali; Eddie Moore Jr.; & Marguerite W. Penick-Parks (editors): Everyday White People Confront Racial and Social Injustice: 15 Stories.
Joseph Barndt:
Jennifer Beech: White Out A Guidebook for Teaching and Engaging with Critical Whiteness Studies .
Drick Boyd: Disrupting Whiteness: Talking With White People About Racism .
Harry Brod, Emmett Schaeffer, & Cooper Thompson (editors): White Men Challenging Racism: 35 Personal Stories .
Lila Cabbil, Bonnie Berman Cushing, Margery Freeman, Jeff Hitchcock, Kimberley Richards (editors): Accountability and White Anti-racist Organizing: Stories from Our work .
David Campt:
CCDS Socialist Education Project: Taking Down White Supremacy .
Chris Crass:
Emma Dabiri: What White People Can Do Next: From Allyship to Coalition .
Robin DiAngelo:
Joe R. Feagin: The White Racial Frame: Centuries of Racial Framing and Counter-Framing .
Judy Grahn: Descent to the Roses of a Family: A Poet’s Journey into Anti-Racism and Personal Social Healing .
Caroline T. Haskell & Ann Todd Jealous (editors): Combined Destinies: Whites Sharing Grief about Racism .
Matthew Hughey: White Bound: Nationalists, Antiracists, and the Shared Meanings of Race .
Noel Ignatiev and John Garvey: Race Traitor .
Debby Irving: Waking Up White, and Finding Myself in the Story of Race.
Frances Kendall: Understanding White Privilege: Creating Pathways to Authentic Relationships Across Race.
Ibram X. Kendi: How to be an Antiracist .
Tammie M. Kennedy, Joyce Irene Middleton, & Krista Ratcliffe (editors): Rhetorics of Whiteness: Postracial Hauntings in Popular Culture, Social Media, and Education .
Paul Kivel: Uprooting Racism – 4th Edition: How White People Can Work for Racial Justice.
Heather McGhee: The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together .
Peggy McIntosh: On Privilege, Fraudulence, and Teaching As Learning: Selected Essays 1981-2019 .
Resmaa Menakem: My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies .
Eileen O’Brien: Whites Confront Racism: Antiracists and their Paths to Action .
Tema Okun: The Emperor Has No Clothes: Teaching About Race And Racism To People Who Don’t Want To Know .
Tawana “Honeycomb” Petty: Towards Humanity: Shifting the Culture of Anti-Racism Organizing .
Layla Saad: Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor .
Catherine A. Sanderson: Why We Act: Turning Bystanders into Moral Rebels .
Mab Segrest: Memoir of a Race Traitor: Fighting Racism in the American South.
Anneliese A. Singh: The Racial Healing Handbook: Practical Activities to Help You Challenge Privilege, Confront Systemic Racism, and Engage in Collective Healing .
Shannon Sullivan:
Becky Thompson: Promise And A Way Of Life: White Antiracist Activism.
Mark R. Warren: Fire in the Heart: How White Activists Embrace Racial Justice.
Tim Wise:
George Yancy: White Self-Criticality beyond Anti-racism: How Does It Feel to Be a White Problem?
For histories of White abolitionists, scroll down to the image of John Brown. Please consider purchasing these titles from your favorite local bookstore.
Children’s Books
Audrey Ades & Chiara Fedele: The Rabbi and the Reverend: Joachim Prinz, Martin Luther King Jr., and Their Fight against Silence .
Joan Trumpauer Mulholland: My Stand for Freedom .
Loki Mulholland, Angela Fairwell, Charlotta Janssen: She Stood for Freedom: The Untold Story of a Civil Rights Hero, Joan Trumpauer Mulholland .
Tracy Newton & Ann M. Trousdale: Cotton Patch Rebel: The Story of Clarence Jordan .
Gwenyth Swain: President of the Underground Railroad: A Story About Levi Coffin .
Rich Wallace & Sandra Neil Wallace: Blood Brother: Jonathan Daniels and His Sacrifice for Civil Rights .
All Other Books
Emmy Schrader Adams; Elaine DeLott Baker; Joan C. Browning; Dorothy Dawson Burlage; Constance Curry; Casey Hayden; Penny Patch; Therese Del Pozzo; & Sue Thrasher: Deep in Our Hearts: Nine White Women in the Freedom Movement.
Frank Adams: James A Dombrowski: An American Heretic, 1897-1983.
Frank Adams & Myles Horton: Unearthing Seeds of Fire: The Idea of Highlander .
Herbert Aptheker: Anti-Racism in U.S. History: The First Two Hundred Years .
Chuck Armsbury: Odyssey of a Mother Country Radical .
Bill Ayers: Fugitive Days: Memoirs of an Antiwar Activist .
Stanley Keith Arnold: Building the Beloved Community: Philadelphia’s Interracial Civil Rights Organizations and Race Relations, 1930–1970.
Dan Berger: Outlaws of America: The Weather Underground and the Politics of Solidarity .
William Ayers & Bernardine Dohrn: Race Course: Against White Supremacy .
Erin Royston Battat: Ain’t Got No Home: America’s Great Migrations and the Making of an Interracial Left .
Patricia Bell-Scott: The Firebrand and the First Lady: Portrait of a Friendship: Pauli Murray, Eleanor Roosevelt, and the Struggle for Social Justice .
Drick Boyd: White Allies in the Struggle for Racial Justice .
Sarah Patton Boyle: The Desegregated Heart; A Virginian’s Stand in Time of Transition .
Anne Braden: The Wall Between .
Cynthia Stokes Brown: Refusing Racism .
James T. Campbell & Elaine Owens. Mississippi Witness: The Photographs of Florence Mars .
David L. Chappell: Inside Agitators: White Southerners in the Civil Rights Movement .
Leilah Danielson: American Gandhi: A. J. Muste and the History of Radicalism in the Twentieth Century.
Morris Dees & Steve Fiffer: A Season for Justice: The Life and Times of Civil Rights Lawyer Morris Dees.
Marc Dollinger: Black Power, Jewish Politics: Reinventing the Alliance in the 1960s .
Martin Duberman: Howard Zinn: A Life on the Left .
Virginia Durr: Outside the Magic Circle: The Autobiography of Virginia Foster Durr.
Virginia Durr & Patricia Sullivan: Freedom Writer: Virginia Foster Durr, Letters From the Civil Rights Years.
Fred Hobson: But Now I See: The White Southern Racial Conversion Narrative .
Myles Horton:
John Egerton: Speak Now Against the Day: The Generation Before the Civil Rights Movement in the South .
Robert Hunt Ferguson: Remaking the Rural South: Interracialism, Christian Socialism, and Cooperative Farming in Jim Crow Mississippi.
Catherine Fosl: Subversive Southerner: Anne Braden and the Struggle for Racial Justice in the Cold War South .
John M. Glen: Highlander: No Ordinary School .
Gwendolyn Midlo Hall: Haunted by Slavery: A Memoir of a Southern White Woman in the Freedom Struggle .
Jacquelyn Dowd Hall: Sisters and Rebels: A Struggle for the Soul of America .
Debby Irving: Waking Up White, and Finding Myself in the Story of Race.
Chervis Isom: The Newspaper Boy: Coming of Age in Birmingham, Alabama, During the Civil Rights Era .
Selma James: Sex, Race, and Class .
Fred Jerome and Roger Taylor:Einstein on Race and Racism.
Spoma Jovanovic: Democracy, Dialogue, and Community Action: Truth and Reconciliation in Greensboro .
Davis D. Joyce: Howard Zinn: A Radical American Vision .
Ben Kamin: Dangerous Friendship: Stanley Levison, Martin Luther King Jr., and the Kennedy Brothers .
Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz: The Colors of Jews: Racial Politics and Radical Diasporism.
Arthur Kinoy: Rights on Trial: The Odyssey of a People’s Lawyer .
Irwin Klibaner: Conscience of a Troubled South: The Southern Conference Educational Fund, 1946-1966.
Linda Krueger: Simple Decency and Common Sense: The Southern Conference Movement, 1938–1963 .
Thomas Krueger: And Promises to Keep: The Southern Conference for Human Welfare, 1938-1948 .
Kimberly K. Little: You Must Be from the North: Southern White Women in the Memphis Civil Rights Movement .
Katharine Du Pre Lumpkin:The Making of a Southerner .
Danny Lyon: Memories of the Southern Civil Rights Movement by Danny Lyon .
Florence Mars: Witness in Philadelphia .
Gary May: The Informant: The FBI, the Ku Klux Klan, and the Murder of Viola Liuzzo .
Gregg L. Michel: Struggle for a Better South: The Southern Student Organizing Committee, 1964-1969 .
Hilary Moore & James Tracy: No Fascist USA!: The John Brown Anti-Klan Committee and Lessons for Today’s Movements.
Gail S. Murray: Throwing Off the Cloak of Privilege: White Southern Women Activists in the Civil Rights Era .
GaryMurrell:“The Most Dangerous Communist in the United States”: A Biography of Herbert Aptheker.
Lise Pearlman: Call Me Phaedra: The Life and Times of Movement Lawyer Fay Stender .
James Peck: Freedom Ride .
Stephen Preskill: Education in Black and White: Myles Horton and the Highlander Center’s Vision for Social Justice .
Joachim Prinz: Joachim Prinz, Rebellious Rabbi: An Autobiography—the German and Early American Years .
Susan M. Reverby: Co-conspirator for Justice: The Revolutionary Life of Dr. Alan Berkman .
Joseph T. Reiff: Born of Conviction: White Methodists and Mississippi’s Closed Society.
Kim Ruehl: A Singing Army: Zilphia Horton and the Highlander Folk School .
John A. Salmond: A Southern Rebel: The Life and Times of Aubrey Willis Williams, 1890-1965 .
Debra L. Schultz: Going South: Jewish Women in the Civil Rights Movement .
MabSegrest:Memoir of a Race Traitor: Fighting Racism in the American South.
James Smallwood: Reform, Red Scare, and Ruin: Virginia Durr, Prophet of the New South .
LillianSmith:Killers of the Dream.
LillianSmith & Margaret Rose Gladney: How Am I to Be Heard?: Letters of Lillian Smith.
Lillian Smith. Edited by Lisa Hodgens & Margaret Rose Gladney: A Lillian Smith Reader.
Mary Stanton:
Anne Stefani: Unlikely Dissenters: White Southern Women in the Fight for Racial Justice, 1920–1970 .
Nancy Stoller: Southern White Girl Seeks Social Change: A Twentieth Century Memoir .
Becky Thompson: Promise And A Way Of Life: White Antiracist Activism .
T. K. Thorne: Behind the Magic Curtain: Secrets, Spies, and Unsung White Allies of Birmingham’s Civil Rights Days .
James P. Turner: Selma and the Liuzzo Murder Trials: The First Modern Civil Rights Convictions .
Clive Webb: Fight against Fear: Southern Jews and Black Civil Rights .
Bob Zellner: The Wrong Side of Murder Creek: A White Southerner in the Freedom Movement.
Histories of White Abolitionists
Osborne Anderson: A Voice from Harper’s Ferry .
Lerone Bennett: Pioneers in Protest .
Richard Owen Boyer: The Legend of John Brown: A Biography and a History .
W.E.B. Du Bois: John Brown.
Tony Horwitz: Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War .
Gerda Lerner: The Grimke Sisters from South Carolina: Pioneers for Women’s Rights and Abolition.
Henry Mayer: All on Fire: William Lloyd Garrison and the Abolition of Slavery .
Eugene L. Meyer: Five for Freedom: The African American Soldiers in John Brown’s Army .
Gary B. Nash: Warner Mifflin: Unflinching Quaker Abolitionist .
Marcus Rediker: The Fearless Benjamin Lay: The Quaker Dwarf Who Became the First Revolutionary Abolitionist With a New Preface .
David S. Reynolds: John Brown, Abolitionist: The Man Who Killed Slavery, Sparked the Civil War, and Seeded Civil Rights .
John Stauffer: The Black Hearts of Men: Radical Abolitionists and the Transformation of Race .
Dorothy Wickenden: The Agitators: Three Friends Who Fought for Abolition and Women’s Rights .
American Psychologist: Racial Microaggressions in Everyday Life .
Courtney Ariel:
Maneesh Arora & LaGina Gause: Not all of last year’s Black Lives Matter protesters supported Black Lives Matter: The largest, broadest and most sustained protests in U.S. history brought out many people who were protesting other things, our research found .
Better Allies: weekly articles on Medium .
Elizabeth Baker & Brian Mann: Black Protest Leaders To White Allies: ‘It’s Our Turn To Lead Our Own Fight.’
Jason W. Biehl: Dear White Friends, I Need Us To Do More .
Eula Biss: White Debt: Reckoning With What Is Owed .
Matt Bonesteel: After the NFL’s white players are called out, Eagles’ Chris Long steps up .
adrienne maree brown: A Word to White Folks in Two Parts .
Say Burgin: Black Lives Matter, Black Power, and the Role of White Allies .
Lynn Burnett:
David Campt: collections of articles on Medium and Huffpost .
Catalyst Project:
Jennifer Chudy: Many whites are protesting with Black Lives Matter. How far will their support go? My research finds white sympathy has its limits .
Jennifer Chudy and Hakeem Jefferson: Support for Black Lives Matter Surged Last Year. Did It Last?
Robin DiAngelo: links to many articles on her webpage .
Noura Erakat & Paul C Gorski: Racism, whiteness, and burnout in antiracism movements: How white racial justice activists elevate burnout in racial justice activists of color in the United States .
Ashley Farmer: Echoes of the 1960s: SNCC and White Liberal Participation in Anti-Racist Movements .
Dahlia Ferlito: articles at LA Progressive , KNOCK LA , and Medium .
Karen Fleshman: collection of articles on Medium .
Chanelle Gallant: Why Would White Women Vote For A Man So Widely Accused Of Sexual Abuse?
Justin Gomer & Christopher Petrella: White Fragility, Anti-Racist Pedagogy, and the Weight of History .
Justin Gomer & Christopher Petrella: White Supremacy Is Not an Illness .
Rigoberto González: The Privilege of the Ally: Allies can be powerful aides to social justice movements—but it is their responsibility to make sure they don’t become a distraction from the cause .
Amy Harmon & Audra D. S. Burch: White Americans Say They Are Waking Up to Racism. What Will It Add Up To? Anti-racism activists have detailed concerns that are not only about symbols or slurs but also about entire systems governing how Americans live .
Amy Harmon & Sabrina Tavernise: One Big Difference About George Floyd Protests: Many White Faces .
Tiffanie Harrison: Dear White Friends, I Need You To Be Loud .
Marcus Harrison Green: What White Marchers Mean for Black Lives Matter: As black activists burn out and move out, the number of white allies grows .
Ann Doss Helms: Bree Newsome, James Tyson talk about SC Confederate flag grab .
Debby Irving: Author Q&A: Author Debby Irving says it’s time for white people to join the race conversation .
Paul Kivel:
Hari Kunzru: The Wages of Whiteness .
B Loewe: White Anti-Racist Organizers in Working Class Communities of Color: an interview with B Loewe of the Latino Union of Chicago . Interview by Chris Crass.
David A. Love: Portland shows that White allies can play a vital role in social justice movements: Their skin color lets them call attention to the brutality faced by African Americans .
Tatiana Mac:
Peggy McIntosh: White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack . See also Beyond the Knapsack and her original, long-form article on which “Invisible Knapsack” was based: White Privilege and Male Privilege . See also her interview, The Origins of “Privilege” . Finally, see Gina Crosley-Corcoran’s working-class take on Knapsack , “Explaining White Privilege To A Broke White Person.”
Deray Mckesson: How you can be an ally in the fight for racial justice .
Ali Michael: Antiracism Resources for Teachers.
Carla Murphy: The White Conversation on Race .
Tema Okun:
Tyler Parry: A Brief History of the “Black Friend.”
Melissa Phruksachart: The Literature of White Liberalism: The popular new genre of antiracist nonfiction seeks to educate white readers about race, but it does not center more powerful critiques from the Black radical tradition .
Poor & Working Class Survivors for Black Lives: White Women for Defunding the Police .
David Roediger: In conversation with George Yancy: It’s Time for “Whiteness as Usual” to End .
James K. Rowe: Baldwin and Buddhism: Death Denial, White Supremacy, and the Promise of Racial Justice .
Mab Segrest: Interview with Sinister Wisdom: A Multicultural Lesbian Literary and Arts Journal. Article: Lesbian-feminist Mab Segrest on Ferguson, race, civil rights .
Kim Severson: Her Family Owned Slaves. How Can She Make Amends? Stacie Marshall, who inherited a Georgia farm, is trying on a small scale to address a generations-old wrong that still bedevils the nation .
Showing Up For Racial Justice: Three Years After #Charlottesville; Reflections for Today’s Movement .
Showing Up For Racial Justice:
Corinne Shutack: 75 Things White People Can Do for Racial Justice .
Dara Silverman: 7 Ways White Jews Can Do Better By the Movement for Black Lives .
SNCC: Black Power: A Reprint of a Position Paper for the SNCC Vine City Project . (SNCC statement on White allies.)
Southern Crossroads:
Amanda Stahl (SURJ Disability Access Co-Coordinator): White People with Disabilities — We Must Show Up for Black Lives .
Bryan Stevenson (interview): What Well-Meaning White People Need to Know About Race: An interview with Harvard University-trained public defense lawyer Bryan Stevenson on racial trauma, segregation, and listening to marginalized voices .
Emily Stewart: How to be a good white ally, according to activists: Three experts on what it does and doesn’t mean to be an ally, now and always .
Teaching Tolerance: Affirming Black Lives Without Inducing Trauma .
Becky Thompson: collection of articles on her personal website .
Mark R. Warren: Links to books and articles at his website .
Steven Wineman: Racism Diminishes Us All, Even White Men Like Me .
Tim Wise: Tim publishes regularly on his Medium account .
George Yancy:
Robin Young: ‘Rednecks For Black Lives’ Urges Southerners To Fight For Racial Justice .
Sue Borrego: TEDx Talk: Understanding My Privilege.
David Campt: lots of helpful video clips of White antiracist trainings at his YouTube page.
Chris Crass: Awkward White People White People in Solidarity Against Racism Faith and Racial Justice Courage for Racial Justice, Courage for Collective Liberation .
RobinDiAngelo: Debunking The Most Common Myths White People Tell About Race Deconstructing White Privilege White Fragility
Dahlia Ferlito: What is White People for Black Lives? ; White People Talking to White People About Race.
Erin Heaney, Pam McMichael, & Carla F. Wallace: White Women Showing Up For Racial Justice
Debby Irving: Finding Myself in the Story of Race (TEDx Talk); How White People Can Advocate For Racial Justice Our Whitewashed History interview on Restorative Justice on the Rise.
Frances Kendall: interview about how to create institutional change .
Paul Kivel: 2019 interview about his book, Uprooting Racism: How White People Can Work for Racial Justice.
Carol Kraemer and Carla F Wallace: “Where are the white people organizing other white people for racial justice?”
Simma Lieberman’s podcast: Every Day Conversations on Race for Every Day People .
Peggy McIntosh TED Talk: How Studying Privilege Systems Can Strengthen Compassion .
Ali Michael, interview about White racial identity development. Lecture: Race in the Academy . TEDx Talk: How Can I Have a Positive Racial Identity? I’m White!
On Being podcast:
Dean Radcliffe-Lynes (documentary and conversation): Whites on the Front Lines .
Catherine Sanderson: ‘Why We Act’: What Makes People Decide To Speak Up Or Stay Silent .
Scene On Radio (podcast): Seeing White .
Mab Segrest: 2014 video interview on the Laura Flanders Show; Audio interview: ‘Race Traitor’ Mab Segrest Looks Back At 25 Years Of Hate .
Carla F. Wallace: the co-founder of SURJ discusses her life at the Kentucky Civil Rights Hall of Fame. (Scroll down for series on Wallace.)
Mark R. Warren: Youth and Racial Justice How You Can Be an Advocate The Practice and Pedagogy of Organizing in the 21st Century Educational Justice with Bill Ayers, Mark Warren and Brandon Johnson Fire in the Heart – White Activists for Racial Justice
Tim Wise: Checking White Privilege Race and Whiteness in the Era of Trumpism On Race, Crime, and the Politics of Fear in America
Image: James Ian Tyson being arrested alongside Bree Newsome for taking down the Confederate Flag in front of the South Carolina State House on June 27, 2015.
ORGANIZATIONS
The easiest way to find local White antiracist groups is to look at SURJ’s list , which includes SURJ chapters as well as affiliated White antiracist groups organized by state and city. SURJ (Showing Up for Racial Justice) is a nationwide network of White antiracist groups, with chapters in over 175 cities.
See also SURJ’s commitments to building White working-class antiracism ; to disability justice within White antiracist spaces; to organizing White faith communities , and SURJ’s mobilizing of White antiracist artists and cultural workers through its affiliated group White Artists for Racial Justice . Also check out Southern Crossroads , an important effort to build a White southern antiracist movement, shift White southern culture, and impact voting in the South.
White antiracist groups, historically and in the present, tend to be predominantly female. White women and LGBT people are far more likely join antiracist groups than men, and especially straight men. The SURJ-affiliated Organizing White Men for Collective Liberation is the major example of an organization working to bring White men into antiracist work. STAND is another.
For deep-dive trainings in White antiracist organizing, see the Catalyst Project: Anti-Racism for Collective Liberation , and especially their Anne Braden Anti-Racist Organizer Training Program . For other White antiracist organizations, trainings, and workshops, see:
ON SOCIAL MEDIA
Follow dozens of SURJ chapters, White antiracist organizations, and White antiracist organizers on Twitter here . To plug into local White antiracist discussions happening on Facebook, check out SURJ’s list of chapters to see which local groups have Facebook pages. Follow The White Noise Collective on Facebook here ; the Catalyst Project here ; White People 4 Black Lives here ; SURJ’s main Facebook page here ; Organizing White Men for Collective Liberation here ; & Southern Crossroads here .
RESOURCE PAGES
Many White antiracist organizations have excellent resource pages: here are those of SURJ ; AWARE-LA ; the Catalyst Project ; Allies for Change ; The White Noise Collective , the Challenging White Supremacy Workshop , and White Accomplices . Prominent White antiracists who have resource pages include Paul Kivel (who has been training White antiracists for decades,) Chris Crass (cofounder of the Catalyst Project,) Tema Okun (author of White Supremacy Culture,) and the late Margo Adair’s Tools For Change . See also Scaffolded Anti-Racist Resources White Ally Toolkit
BOOKS, ARTICLES, VIDEOS, & PODCASTS
In memory of Heather Heyer.
Copyright © 2025 The Cross Cultural Solidarity History Project
