"Our Conversation Omits a Major Portion of the Evidence"

"The final thing that happened was I became convinced that an unfortunate swath of  popular writers/pundits/intellectuals are deeply ignorant of American history. For the past two years, I've been lucky enough to directly interact with a number of historians, anthropologists, economists, and sociologists in the academy. The debates I've encountered at Brandeis, Virginia Commonwealth, Yale, Northwestern, Rhodes, and Duke have been some of the most challenging and enlightening since I left Howard University. The difference in tenor between those conversations and the ones I have in the broader world, are disturbing. What is considered to be a 'blue period' on this blog, is considered to be a survey course among academics. Which is not to say everyone, or even mostly everyone, agrees with me in the academy. It is to say that I've yet to engage a historian or sociologist who's requested that I not be such a downer."


At The Atlantic, Ta-Nehisi Coates explores what led up to his new cover story, "The Case for Reparations."


And Manuel Roig-Franzia writes about Coates in The Washington Post.