Urgent message on ghetto life
Tommie Shelby, the Caldwell Titcomb Professor of African and African American Studies and of Philosophy, recently published “Dark Ghettos: Injustice, Dissent, and Reform,” a bold work that gives philosophical context to one of the country’s most critical social problems. In a Q&A, Shelby outlined the cultural, political, and personal history that helped shaped his book. GAZETTE: What prompted you to write this book? SHELBY: I’ve long been thinking about the relationship between race and class, and in the tradition of political philosophy I most identify with, one of the key problems is how economic justice and racial justice are connected. I’m also interested in the ways that racial prejudice and racial division function as obstacles to creating more just economic relations among citizens. I thought it might be fruitful to think about how these questions play out in disadvantaged black urban neighborhoods. I’ve been talking about ghetto poverty since I first...