I bought this in November 2021 (I’d really like to get into 2022’s books at some point! I just checked and I have five more to go from 2021) as part of a haul of social justice books from the local Oxfam Books – someone must have donated them pretty quickly as they were good as new. Of the four I bought then, I have now read and reviewed two and I’m reading one, with one more to come. I have read and reviewed the other four books acquired that month, so not doing tooooo badly.

Dr Shola Mos-Shogbamimu – “This is Why I Resist: Don’t Define my Black Identity”

(23 November 2021, Oxfam Books)

To readers looking for a dispassionate piece of writing or words sugar-coated to make you feel comfortable, this book is not it. The power of my resistance is fuelled by my passion, pride, anger, frustration, joy and authenticity. My accomplishments, as a Black woman, are not proof that racism does not exist but evidence of God’s grace and the sacrfices of giants before me, including my parents, who paved the way.” (p. 3)

This righteously and rightfully angry and forthright boook was written and then published in the heat of the post-George Floyd / Black Lives Matter times when a whole sheaf of books by Black authors were published and got onto all those reading lists. Reading it now, a few years on (following my policy of not reading everything all at once but spacing such books out to continue sharing their impact), it feels almost like a historical document – and an important one regarding several aspects.

We see a woman who has battled against systemic racism her whole life getting space to have her say and saying it. We read her talking about events that happened and personal interactions she had on UK media and social media. And we see many examples which might now even be lost, but are definitely lost back in the Twitter/X timeline, of reactions to events and articles from different sides.

I don’t suppose that at the time it was intended to provide a record of how things felt for a Black academic woman in the public eye in 2020/2021 (boldly opening with a quote from the Telegraph newspaper claiming she is “arguably one of the most toxic voices in Britain’s race relations debate”!) but it does, and that’s of value now.

The book covers the bases it was useful to explain at that time: what is racism and how was it invented and promoted / what is White privilege, useful suggested answers to common racial microaggressions, and then also looks at feminism, which isn’t always covered. I wonder if it’s achieved it’s aim, though, sadly: “This is Why I Reist is a declaration that the Black identity will no longer be defined by a prejudiced mindset steeped in institutional racism that enforces White supremacy” (p. 5). It’s very interesting that the author is at pains to emphasise that it’s not all White people / women who are racist or exclusionary: later books I’ve read go more down the route of yes, all White people are complicit, so it’s interesting as presumably a tactic or something imposed by the publisher as presumably a way to make the work more palatable to White readers.

So lots of value here both as a guide and as a document of record.

This is Book 21 in my 2024 TBR project – 120 to go!