Are White Men Smarter Than Everybody Else?: Playing Offense in the Fight for Racial Justice in America
by Steve Phillips
The New Press, 2026
[Publication date: April 21, 2026]
by Steve Phillips
The New Press, 2026
[Publication date: April 21, 2026]
“Steve Phillips situates our present crisis exactly where it belongs—within the long, unfinished struggle to make real the promise that all are created equal. . . . He reminds us that backlash is not new, but neither is resistance.” —Anna Malaika Tubbs, New York Times bestselling author of Erased and The Three Mothers
In a time when equal rights are facing an unparalleled assault, what if we’ve been framing the conversation about racial justice all wrong? Instead of focusing on the underrepresentation of people of color, what if we examined the overrepresentation of white men?
Building on the urgency and clarity of his New York Times and Washington Post bestseller Brown Is the New White and his “spirited and persuasive” (Publishers Weekly) How We Win the Civil War, these questions drive the explosive premise of author Steve Phillips’s latest book, Are White Men Smarter Than Everybody Else?
Just six years after the racial reckoning that followed the murder of George Floyd, we are witnessing a full-scale assault on equality in America unparalleled since the overthrow of Reconstruction. With the critical 2026 midterms approaching and DEI initiatives under attack nationwide, Phillips’s work is more relevant than ever. He moves beyond defensive measures to offer a powerful offensive strategy. The book introduces the concept of “Straight White American Male Preference” (S.W.A.M.P.) and systematically dismantles the myth of reverse racism.
Through twelve sharp, deeply researched chapters, Phillips reveals how this preference has shaped everything from corporate America and philanthropy to arts and government, creating systemic advantages for white men, who make up a minority (29 percent) of the U.S. population.
This isn’t just another book about inequality; it’s a playbook for a counterattack. Fearless and timely, this much-needed corrective offers equality-loving readers the arguments, data, and inspiration they need to challenge the status quo effectively.
REVIEWS:
Praise for Are White Men Smarter Than Everybody Else?
“Steve Phillips situates our present crisis exactly where it belongs—within the long, unfinished struggle to make real the promise that all are created equal. By tracing a line from the Gettysburg Address to the nationwide, and global, racial reckoning sparked by the murder of George Floyd, he reminds us that backlash is not new, but neither is resistance.”—Anna Malaika Tubbs, New York Times bestselling author of Erased and The Three Mothers
“Steve Phillips says the quiet part out loud. He names, with precision and urgency, the uncomfortable truth many of us, especially those of us who are white, have been taught to skirt around: racial inequality in America is the result of sustained conditioning that leads so many of us to believe that straight white men are far more competent than the rest of us. This book exposes who holds power—and why. This book doesn’t allow white readers to remain spectators. It calls us in and calls us out.”—Erin Heaney, executive director of Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ)
“For more than a decade Steve Phillips has been an indispensable analyst of America’s political failures—and political possibilities. Now, with this provocative and powerful book, he offers the modest suggestion that white men may not be smarter and more talented than the other 71 percent of the population—and that the way to find out is to end straight white American male preference—or, as he puts it so eloquently, the SWAMP—and create a truly multiracial democracy.”—Jon Wiener, historian, journalist, contributing editor of The Nation and host of The Nation’s weekly podcast, Start Making Sense
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Steve Phillips is a New York Times bestselling author, columnist, and national political thought leader. He is a regular columnist for The Guardian and The Nation, and has published opinion articles in The New York Times and Washington Post. He is the author of The New York Times and Washington Post bestselling Brown Is the New White as well as How We Win the Civil War and Are White Men Smarter Than Everybody Else? (all from The New Press); He is also the founder of Democracy in Color, a political media organization dedicated to race, politics, and the multicultural New American Majority. Phillips is the host of Democracy in Color with Steve Phillips, a color-conscious podcast on politics.
The Church Committee Report: Revelations from the Bombshell 1970s Investigation into the National Security State
Edited and introduced by Matthew Guariglia and Brian Hochman
W.W. Norton and Company, 2026
[Publication date: January 13, 2026]
Edited and introduced by Matthew Guariglia and Brian Hochman
W.W. Norton and Company, 2026
[Publication date: January 13, 2026]
After fifty years, this shocking report―released in a single, readable volume for the first time―is still the most accurate account of US government spying on its own citizens.
Fifty years ago, a government investigation led by US senator Frank Church uncovered some of the darkest state secrets of the twentieth century. The Church Committee confirmed the nation’s worst fears about the unchecked power of its intelligence agencies: at the FBI, surveillance campaigns against civil rights leaders and clandestine attempts to disrupt antiwar protests; at the CIA, assassination plots against foreign heads of state, experiments with toxic substances and illegal drugs, and covert partnerships with the Mafia. The Church Committee’s findings were so explosive that key members found themselves on the watch lists of the very government agencies they were investigating. Three witnesses who cooperated with the inquiry were murdered.
Amid the creep of digital surveillance and the upheavals of social protest, this accessible volume, containing the most harrowing revelations of the Church Committee investigation, sheds valuable light on some of today’s most urgent concerns.
REVIEWS:
"Every American who believes a government must be accountable to its citizens should read this report."
Fifty years ago, a government investigation led by US senator Frank Church uncovered some of the darkest state secrets of the twentieth century. The Church Committee confirmed the nation’s worst fears about the unchecked power of its intelligence agencies: at the FBI, surveillance campaigns against civil rights leaders and clandestine attempts to disrupt antiwar protests; at the CIA, assassination plots against foreign heads of state, experiments with toxic substances and illegal drugs, and covert partnerships with the Mafia. The Church Committee’s findings were so explosive that key members found themselves on the watch lists of the very government agencies they were investigating. Three witnesses who cooperated with the inquiry were murdered.
Amid the creep of digital surveillance and the upheavals of social protest, this accessible volume, containing the most harrowing revelations of the Church Committee investigation, sheds valuable light on some of today’s most urgent concerns.
REVIEWS:
"Every American who believes a government must be accountable to its citizens should read this report."
― Senator Ron Wyden
"Even now, half a century after its creation, the Church Committee remains the most influential investigation ever undertaken into the work of the country’s secretive intelligence bureaucracies."
― From the foreword by Beverly Gage, Pulitzer Prize–winning historian and author of G-Man
"A worthwhile overview of a seminal takedown of the deep state."― Publishers Weekly
ABOUT THE EDITORS AND RESEARCHERS:
Matthew Guariglia is a historian and senior policy analyst at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. He is the author of Police and the Empire City: Race and the Origins of Modern Policing in New York. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia.
Brian Hochman is the Hubert J. Cloke Director of American Studies at Georgetown University and author of The Listeners: A History of Wiretapping in the United States. He lives in Washington, DC.
The Secret War Against Hate: American Resistance to Antisemitism and White Supremacy
by Steven J. Ross
Bloomsbury Publishing, 2026
[Publication date: April 28, 2026]
A USA Today Bestseller
From the author of Pulitzer Prize finalist Hitler in Los Angeles, the definitive story of the intrepid activists and spies who fought against a resurgent movement of hate in America-a book that "should be read by every American who wants to know how courageous men and women can resist hatred." (Kirkus Reviews, starred review)
Americans today like to believe that the end of World War II brought a new era of tolerance in the United States. But antisemitism and racism went up-not down-after the war's end. Violence broke out in cities across the country, and the number of organized hate groups more than doubled from 1940 to 1946. In this shocking account of a resurgence of White Supremacy in America, celebrated historian Steven J. Ross reveals how four key leaders-Emory Burke, J. B. Stoner, James Madole, and George Lincoln Rockwell-worked together to “finish the job Hitler had begun,” launching deadly attacks on Jews and African Americans and building a network of terrorists across the U.S. In response to this “war of hate,” three men-Arnold Forster of the Anti-Defamation League, George Mintzer of the American Jewish Committee, and James Sheldon of the Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League-along with dozens of men and women, launched a multipronged effort: They infiltrated, monitored, and undermined these hate groups, putting their own safety on the line and scoring important victories that, today, have been all but forgotten.
Tracing the extraordinary work of these unsung heroes, The Secret War Against Hate provides a groundbreaking reconsideration of the legacy of the “Good War,” and essential reading on how America today can beat hate once again and build a just and united nation.
REVIEWS:
“Richly researched, impressively annotated, burningly bright . . . this book takes readers through familiar times and places with fresh research and a vivid narrative style . . . Personality and media strode hand in hand then, much as now, and Ross alerts us to the deep and ugly history behind today's trolls and truants . . . This book should be read by every American who wants to know how courageous men and women can resist hatred.” ―Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“Well-researched and at times shocking . . . Ross weaves the timelines of these figures together in an easy-to-follow way, showing how they gained power but also highlighting the people and organizations who actively fought against them in public and in spy rings, who each had their own motivations for resisting fascism. Readers will get sucked into the story and want to know what happens next . . . An excellent 'hidden history' book that gives additional context to modern political movements.” ―Library Journal, starred review
“Ross's work is utterly immersive in its sweeping, decades-long tracing of how some Americans have resisted the contagion of hate . . . [The Secret War Against Hate is] vital for any citizen concerned with polarized politics and civic abuses . . . an indispensable manual for safeguarding the future by understanding threats from the past.” ―Shelf Awareness, starred review
“At a time of renewed interest in America's previous fights with fascism, no one has done more than Steven J. Ross to unearth the epic conflicts and characters at the heart of that history. In The Secret War Against Hate, Ross has found a startling new chapter of our history, surfacing villains worthy of any Hollywood horror franchise, and intrepid heroes whose exploits could be written into a national anthem. This book will be taught and read for decades; the more we learn from it, the stronger we will be for the fights ahead, and for the fights already at hand. A brilliant history, a brilliant story. Bravo” ―Rachel Maddow, New York Times bestselling author of PREQUEL
“Ross has written an engrossing, informative, and timely history of the hate groups that energized the far right in the early postwar decades, the anti-hate organizations that infiltrated them, and the spies who gathered information from (and fomented dissent among) those who hate.” ―Washington Independent Review of Books
“Fascinating . . . Ross observes that movements and leaders come and go, but ideas persist. Even ideas as thoroughly debunked as white supremacy, or that America was always intended to be a country for whites alone, remain as emotionally and politically charged today as they were immediately after World War II.” ―California Review of Books
“[An] absorbing study of the brave Americans who fought homegrown Nazism . . . A captivating read.” ―The Irish Independent
“With power and deep insight, Steven Ross has given us the harrowing story of postwar domestic fascism-dripping with racism and antisemitism-and the determined organizations and people who sought to expose its ambitions and defeat it. Eye-opening in content, The Secret War Against Hate is a must-read for anyone interested in the roots of today's radical right and the prospects for resistance to it.” ―Steven Hahn, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A NATION UNDER OUR FEET and ILLIBERAL AMERICA
“Steven Ross's timely and impressively researched book draws a through line of the anti-Semitism that emerged in America in the wake of the Holocaust, continued in various iterations, and has reemerged in our day. He paints vivid portraits of the fanatics, dupes, scoundrels and blood-thirsty loonies who peopled the American fascist movements and of those who worked courageously to defeat them. This history of hate and heroic resistance to hate is chilling, inspiring, and vital reading.” ―Lillian Faderman, author of NAKED IN THE PROMISED LAND and THE GAY REVOLUTION
“Steven Ross's narrative about the Americans who fought to expose and defeat the neo-fascist right in the decades after World War II is highly original, full of insight, and an utterly compelling read. Anyone who wants to understand the roots of the hatemongers who befoul our politics today should read this book.” ―Michael Kazin, author of WHAT IT TOOK TO WIN: A HISTORY OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
“In his gripping new book, Steven J. Ross unflinchingly examines American Hitlerism and efforts to expose it. Recent events bring home tragically the pertinence of Ross's instructive narrative.” ―Randall Kennedy, Michael R. Klein Professor of Law, Harvard Law School
“In this revelatory study, Steven Ross brings out of the shadows a series of far right agitators who have remained largely unknown to both professional scholars and the general public. He convincingly reveals that a fascist tradition has always existed in the United States, while compellingly showing how ordinary Americans have worked to counteract it. Combining original research and sober analysis, the book could not be more timely.” ―Gavriel D. Rosenfeld, author of THE FOURTH REICH: THE SPECTER OF NAZISM FROM WORLD WAR II TO THE PRESENT
“Set against the backdrop of postwar America, Steven Ross's meticulously researched and engaging narrative illuminates the increasingly pernicious development of White Supremacy and rightwing extremism, and those few organizations and individuals who worked to limit the impact of illiberal forces. He outlines, like few before him, the precedents that frame many of the present-day debates on whether the US should remain an inclusive democracy or revert to atavistic society that limits opportunities for those outside the majority. Despite heroic efforts by civil society to keep these forces at bay after 1945, Ross notes rightly that extremist leaders might pass, “but ideas persist forever.” Understanding the origins of today's extremisms, the approaches that proved successful in resisting them, and how this past shapes our future make The Secret War Against Hate an indispensable and important contribution to the field” ―Robert J. Williams, CEO and Finci-Viterbi Chair of the USC Shoah Foundation and UNESCO Chair on Antisemitism and Holocaust Research
From the author of Pulitzer Prize finalist Hitler in Los Angeles, the definitive story of the intrepid activists and spies who fought against a resurgent movement of hate in America-a book that "should be read by every American who wants to know how courageous men and women can resist hatred." (Kirkus Reviews, starred review)
Americans today like to believe that the end of World War II brought a new era of tolerance in the United States. But antisemitism and racism went up-not down-after the war's end. Violence broke out in cities across the country, and the number of organized hate groups more than doubled from 1940 to 1946. In this shocking account of a resurgence of White Supremacy in America, celebrated historian Steven J. Ross reveals how four key leaders-Emory Burke, J. B. Stoner, James Madole, and George Lincoln Rockwell-worked together to “finish the job Hitler had begun,” launching deadly attacks on Jews and African Americans and building a network of terrorists across the U.S. In response to this “war of hate,” three men-Arnold Forster of the Anti-Defamation League, George Mintzer of the American Jewish Committee, and James Sheldon of the Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League-along with dozens of men and women, launched a multipronged effort: They infiltrated, monitored, and undermined these hate groups, putting their own safety on the line and scoring important victories that, today, have been all but forgotten.
Tracing the extraordinary work of these unsung heroes, The Secret War Against Hate provides a groundbreaking reconsideration of the legacy of the “Good War,” and essential reading on how America today can beat hate once again and build a just and united nation.
REVIEWS:
“Richly researched, impressively annotated, burningly bright . . . this book takes readers through familiar times and places with fresh research and a vivid narrative style . . . Personality and media strode hand in hand then, much as now, and Ross alerts us to the deep and ugly history behind today's trolls and truants . . . This book should be read by every American who wants to know how courageous men and women can resist hatred.” ―Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“Well-researched and at times shocking . . . Ross weaves the timelines of these figures together in an easy-to-follow way, showing how they gained power but also highlighting the people and organizations who actively fought against them in public and in spy rings, who each had their own motivations for resisting fascism. Readers will get sucked into the story and want to know what happens next . . . An excellent 'hidden history' book that gives additional context to modern political movements.” ―Library Journal, starred review
“Ross's work is utterly immersive in its sweeping, decades-long tracing of how some Americans have resisted the contagion of hate . . . [The Secret War Against Hate is] vital for any citizen concerned with polarized politics and civic abuses . . . an indispensable manual for safeguarding the future by understanding threats from the past.” ―Shelf Awareness, starred review
“At a time of renewed interest in America's previous fights with fascism, no one has done more than Steven J. Ross to unearth the epic conflicts and characters at the heart of that history. In The Secret War Against Hate, Ross has found a startling new chapter of our history, surfacing villains worthy of any Hollywood horror franchise, and intrepid heroes whose exploits could be written into a national anthem. This book will be taught and read for decades; the more we learn from it, the stronger we will be for the fights ahead, and for the fights already at hand. A brilliant history, a brilliant story. Bravo” ―Rachel Maddow, New York Times bestselling author of PREQUEL
“Ross has written an engrossing, informative, and timely history of the hate groups that energized the far right in the early postwar decades, the anti-hate organizations that infiltrated them, and the spies who gathered information from (and fomented dissent among) those who hate.” ―Washington Independent Review of Books
“Fascinating . . . Ross observes that movements and leaders come and go, but ideas persist. Even ideas as thoroughly debunked as white supremacy, or that America was always intended to be a country for whites alone, remain as emotionally and politically charged today as they were immediately after World War II.” ―California Review of Books
“[An] absorbing study of the brave Americans who fought homegrown Nazism . . . A captivating read.” ―The Irish Independent
“With power and deep insight, Steven Ross has given us the harrowing story of postwar domestic fascism-dripping with racism and antisemitism-and the determined organizations and people who sought to expose its ambitions and defeat it. Eye-opening in content, The Secret War Against Hate is a must-read for anyone interested in the roots of today's radical right and the prospects for resistance to it.” ―Steven Hahn, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A NATION UNDER OUR FEET and ILLIBERAL AMERICA
“Steven Ross's timely and impressively researched book draws a through line of the anti-Semitism that emerged in America in the wake of the Holocaust, continued in various iterations, and has reemerged in our day. He paints vivid portraits of the fanatics, dupes, scoundrels and blood-thirsty loonies who peopled the American fascist movements and of those who worked courageously to defeat them. This history of hate and heroic resistance to hate is chilling, inspiring, and vital reading.” ―Lillian Faderman, author of NAKED IN THE PROMISED LAND and THE GAY REVOLUTION
“Steven Ross's narrative about the Americans who fought to expose and defeat the neo-fascist right in the decades after World War II is highly original, full of insight, and an utterly compelling read. Anyone who wants to understand the roots of the hatemongers who befoul our politics today should read this book.” ―Michael Kazin, author of WHAT IT TOOK TO WIN: A HISTORY OF THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY
“In his gripping new book, Steven J. Ross unflinchingly examines American Hitlerism and efforts to expose it. Recent events bring home tragically the pertinence of Ross's instructive narrative.” ―Randall Kennedy, Michael R. Klein Professor of Law, Harvard Law School
“In this revelatory study, Steven Ross brings out of the shadows a series of far right agitators who have remained largely unknown to both professional scholars and the general public. He convincingly reveals that a fascist tradition has always existed in the United States, while compellingly showing how ordinary Americans have worked to counteract it. Combining original research and sober analysis, the book could not be more timely.” ―Gavriel D. Rosenfeld, author of THE FOURTH REICH: THE SPECTER OF NAZISM FROM WORLD WAR II TO THE PRESENT
“Set against the backdrop of postwar America, Steven Ross's meticulously researched and engaging narrative illuminates the increasingly pernicious development of White Supremacy and rightwing extremism, and those few organizations and individuals who worked to limit the impact of illiberal forces. He outlines, like few before him, the precedents that frame many of the present-day debates on whether the US should remain an inclusive democracy or revert to atavistic society that limits opportunities for those outside the majority. Despite heroic efforts by civil society to keep these forces at bay after 1945, Ross notes rightly that extremist leaders might pass, “but ideas persist forever.” Understanding the origins of today's extremisms, the approaches that proved successful in resisting them, and how this past shapes our future make The Secret War Against Hate an indispensable and important contribution to the field” ―Robert J. Williams, CEO and Finci-Viterbi Chair of the USC Shoah Foundation and UNESCO Chair on Antisemitism and Holocaust Research
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Steven J. Ross is a Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Southern California and Director of the Casden Institute for the Study of the Jewish Role in American Life. He is the author of Hitler in Los Angeles, a Los Angeles Times bestseller and Pulitzer Prize finalist, Hollywood Left and Right, which received the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Film Scholars Award, and Working-Class Hollywood, named a Best Book of the Year by the Los Angeles Times. He lives in Southern California.
There Is No Place For Us: Working and Homeless in America
by Brian Goldstone
Crown, 2026
[Publication date: March 3, 2026]
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE • ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES AND THE ATLANTIC’S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • ONE OF BARACK OBAMA’S FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR • Through the “revelatory and gut-wrenching” (Associated Press) stories of five Atlanta families, this landmark work of journalism exposes a new and troubling trend—the dramatic rise of the working homeless in cities across America.
“An exceptional feat of reporting, full of an immediacy that calls to mind Adrian Nicole LeBlanc’s Random Family and Matthew Desmond’s Evicted.”—The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice)
WINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE • FINALIST FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL AND THE BERNSTEIN AWARD • A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: NPR, The Washington Post, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Elle, New America, BookPage, Shelf Awareness
The working homeless. In a country where hard work and determination are supposed to lead to success, there is something scandalous about this phrase. But skyrocketing rents, low wages, and a lack of tenant rights have produced a startling phenomenon: People with full-time jobs cannot keep a roof over their head, especially in America’s booming cities, where rapid growth is leading to catastrophic displacement. These families are being forced into homelessness not by a failing economy but a thriving one.
In this gripping and deeply reported book, Brian Goldstone plunges readers into the lives of five Atlanta families struggling to remain housed in a gentrifying, increasingly unequal city. Maurice and Natalia make a fresh start in the country’s “Black Mecca” after being priced out of DC. Kara dreams of starting her own cleaning business while mopping floors at a public hospital. Britt scores a coveted housing voucher. Michelle is in school to become a social worker. Celeste toils at her warehouse job while undergoing treatment for ovarian cancer. Each of them aspires to provide a decent life for their children—and each of them, one by one, joins the ranks of the nation’s working homeless.
Through intimate, novelistic portraits, Goldstone reveals the human cost of this crisis, following parents and their kids as they go to sleep in cars, or in squalid extended-stay hotel rooms, and head out to their jobs and schools the next morning. These are the nation’s hidden homeless—omitted from official statistics, and proof that overflowing shelters and street encampments are only the most visible manifestation of a far more pervasive problem.
By turns heartbreaking and urgent, There Is No Place for Us illuminates the true magnitude, causes, and consequences of the new American homelessness—and shows that it won’t be solved until housing is treated as a fundamental human right.
REVIEWS:
“[Goldstone] writes about a ruthless housing system that profits from people’s desperation and penalizes them for being poor. I was moved by this book. I also felt enraged.”
“An exceptional feat of reporting, full of an immediacy that calls to mind Adrian Nicole LeBlanc’s Random Family and Matthew Desmond’s Evicted.”—The New York Times Book Review (Editors’ Choice)
WINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE • FINALIST FOR THE ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL AND THE BERNSTEIN AWARD • A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: NPR, The Washington Post, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Elle, New America, BookPage, Shelf Awareness
The working homeless. In a country where hard work and determination are supposed to lead to success, there is something scandalous about this phrase. But skyrocketing rents, low wages, and a lack of tenant rights have produced a startling phenomenon: People with full-time jobs cannot keep a roof over their head, especially in America’s booming cities, where rapid growth is leading to catastrophic displacement. These families are being forced into homelessness not by a failing economy but a thriving one.
In this gripping and deeply reported book, Brian Goldstone plunges readers into the lives of five Atlanta families struggling to remain housed in a gentrifying, increasingly unequal city. Maurice and Natalia make a fresh start in the country’s “Black Mecca” after being priced out of DC. Kara dreams of starting her own cleaning business while mopping floors at a public hospital. Britt scores a coveted housing voucher. Michelle is in school to become a social worker. Celeste toils at her warehouse job while undergoing treatment for ovarian cancer. Each of them aspires to provide a decent life for their children—and each of them, one by one, joins the ranks of the nation’s working homeless.
Through intimate, novelistic portraits, Goldstone reveals the human cost of this crisis, following parents and their kids as they go to sleep in cars, or in squalid extended-stay hotel rooms, and head out to their jobs and schools the next morning. These are the nation’s hidden homeless—omitted from official statistics, and proof that overflowing shelters and street encampments are only the most visible manifestation of a far more pervasive problem.
By turns heartbreaking and urgent, There Is No Place for Us illuminates the true magnitude, causes, and consequences of the new American homelessness—and shows that it won’t be solved until housing is treated as a fundamental human right.
REVIEWS:
“[Goldstone] writes about a ruthless housing system that profits from people’s desperation and penalizes them for being poor. I was moved by this book. I also felt enraged.”
—Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times Book Review
“Goldstone stitches together a textured and extraordinarily detailed narrative of [five families’] multiyear struggle to keep a roof over their heads. The effect is reminiscent of Random Family. . . . There Is No Place for Us shifts the paradigm on homelessness.”
“Goldstone stitches together a textured and extraordinarily detailed narrative of [five families’] multiyear struggle to keep a roof over their heads. The effect is reminiscent of Random Family. . . . There Is No Place for Us shifts the paradigm on homelessness.”
—The Washington Post
“An incredible feat . . . Stunning . . . A book like this ought to be a rallying cry, the 21st-century equivalent of Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle.”
—The Nation
“Beautifully crafted . . . Revelatory and often heartbreaking . . . [Goldstone] has the clear eye and deft touch of a master storyteller. There Is No Place for Us reveals an America few of us know.”
—The New York Review of Books
“Poignant . . . Through in-depth and often heart-rending accounts, Mr. Goldstone shows why [families] lack stable housing and face difficulties in acquiring it.”
—The Wall Street Journal
“Brian Goldstone’s stunning nonfiction debut, There Is No Place for Us, traces the downfall of the American worker to the fallout of the American Dream. . . . Magnificently stylistic. . . . [Reads like] a gripping novel.”
— Rolling Stone
“[An] extraordinary work of journalism . . . There Is No Place for Us tells the stories of [five] families with precision and depth.”
— Jezebel
“Devastating . . . [Goldstone] writes with unusual depth and humanity about people whose stories political and media elites largely prefer to ignore.”
—Baffler
“Monumental. . . . For confronting us with an America where there’s still only room at the inn for the wealthy, we are indebted to Goldstone’s essential work exposing the truth. This book isn’t just worthy of our attention; it’s worthy of our outrage.”
— Christian Century
“Read this extraordinary book. If you’re lucky, you’ll be changed.”
—Adrian Nicole LeBlanc, author of Random Family
“In this brilliant book, Brian Goldstone lays bare the hidden disaster of housing precarity among America’s low-wage workers.”
“In this brilliant book, Brian Goldstone lays bare the hidden disaster of housing precarity among America’s low-wage workers.”
—Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, author of Race for Profit
“If you read one book this year—or this decade—it should be There Is No Place for Us.”
“If you read one book this year—or this decade—it should be There Is No Place for Us.”
—Adelle Waldman, author of Help Wanted
“Spellbinding and unflinching . . . this book will devastate you and then set your spirit ablaze.”
—Antonia Hylton, author of Madness
“Deeply reported and written with an empathy that brims from every page . . . [Goldstone] has pulled off a rare and stunning narrative feat.”
—Jonathan Blitzer, author of Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here
“A crucial, masterful book that will change the national conversation about homelessness.”
“A crucial, masterful book that will change the national conversation about homelessness.”
—Rachel Aviv, author of Strangers to Ourselves
“A blistering investigation into the true scope of America’s ballooning homelessness crisis.”
“A blistering investigation into the true scope of America’s ballooning homelessness crisis.”
—Roxanna Asgarian, author of We Were Once a Family
“A tremendous achievement in reporting, in narration, in emotional and intellectual understanding.”
“A tremendous achievement in reporting, in narration, in emotional and intellectual understanding.”
—James Fallows, author of Our Towns
“A model of ethical journalism . . . Make a place for this book alongside Jane Jacobs’ classic Death and Life of Great American Cities.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A gripping, high-stakes account of America’s housing emergency.”
—Publishers Weekly
“There Is No Place for Us belongs on the shelf next to Matthew Desmond’s Pulitzer Prize–winning Evicted.”
—BookPage, starred review
“A revelatory and gut-wrenching exploration of an often-ignored homeless population.”
—Associated Press
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Brian Goldstone is a journalist whose longform reporting and essays have appeared in The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, The New Republic, The California Sunday Magazine, and Jacobin, among other publications. He has a PhD in anthropology from Duke University and was a Mellon Research Fellow at Columbia University. In 2021, he was a National Fellow at New America. He lives in Atlanta with his family.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
1
Britt scrutinized her face in the bathroom mirror, hoping she looked less tired than she felt. Sleep had been hard to come by since she began working the closing shift at Low Country, a “new Southern cuisine” restaurant at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. Some nights, after a grinding hour-plus commute from the airport back to her great-grandmother’s apartment in Atlanta’s East Lake neighborhood, she managed to crawl into bed beside her two-year-old son, Kyrie, and four-year-old daughter, Desiree, without waking them. Last night she was not so lucky: Kyrie stirred and Britt was up with him until well past midnight. No sooner had they finally drifted off than Britt’s phone alarm sounded, and it was all she could do to get the kids dressed and fed by six o’clock, when their daycare van arrived. Now, seven hours later, she massaged cocoa butter moisturizer onto her cheeks and forehead. Good enough, she thought with a sigh.
“Britt!” her great-grandmother bellowed over a television commercial. “Don’t forget to tidy up my living room before you leave!” Britt examined herself one last time. She hadn’t been able to wash her line-cook uniform between the previous night’s shift and the one she would be starting shortly, but the stains weren’t too noticeable.
For five months, Britt and her kids had been living out of several oversized tote bags in a corner of the apartment’s compact living room, next to the pullout sofa bed they shared. An ironclad rule at Granny’s apartment was that you pick up after yourself, and as Britt rushed to fold their clothes and blankets, she tried to arrange everything as neatly as possible. She had never asked Granny for a closet or dresser drawer in which to keep these items, in part because it seemed like there wasn’t any room to spare—the older woman had a propensity to squirrel away whatever toy or child’s sweater or pajama set she thought could be handed down to the family’s newest members—but mostly because she needed to believe that their stay at her apartment was only temporary. For her part, Granny made it clear in her own loving but not particularly subtle way that she was in no need of roommates. Britt described it to a friend as a “don’t get too comfortable” situation.
After reassembling the sofa bed and arranging its cushions, Britt hurried into the kitchen to finish preparing the kids’ dinner for later: chicken tenders, rice, green peas, and Pillsbury Crescent Rolls. She glanced at Granny, perched in her rocking chair a few feet away from the TV. Britt often marveled at the disconnect between this kindly arthritic woman, who passed the hours glued to Judge Mathis or Tyler Perry’s Madea movies while clutching her large-print Bible, and the stories she’d grown up hearing about her. Britt’s favorite photo of Granny from her younger years showed a scowling, self-professed hustler outside Butler’s Shoes in downtown Atlanta, sporting an all-white Levi’s denim suit with a smart red bow tie. These days the sole vestige of Granny’s former self was her fierce independence, which a recent diagnosis of Alzheimer’s had done little to diminish.
“Girl, it’s almost one-thirty. Shouldn’t you be on your way?” Britt hadn’t noticed her mom, Cass—short for Cassandra—enter the apartment. As always, the forty-three-year-old had a brusque, tightly coiled energy. She greeted Granny with a quick kiss on the top of her head.
“I’m making food for Des and Kyrie,” Britt replied. “If you could just throw it in the microwave when they get back—”
Cass cut her off. “What? You think I can’t put together some nuggets for my grandchildren?” She said this playfully, if a bit defensively. For a brief moment Britt stared at her, as if there was a lot she could say in response. “You get going and let me handle this,” Cass said.
At the front door, beside Granny’s “wall of fame,” where dozens of pictures taken at graduations and proms and athletic events had been assembled, Britt put on a thin, stylish camouflage-print jacket. “Where’s your coat at?” Cass yelled from the kitchen. “You know how cold it is? Why don’t you step out on that patio and find out.”
“Oh, she thinks she too cute for a puffy jacket,” Granny teased.
“Well, her ass is gonna freeze,” Cass said. The two women laughed. Britt, grinning, said, “Yeah, yeah,” and shut the door behind her.
Outside, Britt headed toward the bus stop on Glenwood Avenue. She had been walking this route since she was a toddler. Granny’s apartment building was a stone’s throw from the public housing project where Britt had spent the first few years of her life. Five generations of the family had lived together at East Lake Meadows. That had not been the plan. When Granny’s mother—“Big Mama,” as everyone called her—landed a job at an Atlanta printing factory in 1961, her hope was to eventually purchase her own house. But this was before the Fair Housing Act was signed into law. A century of housing discrimination ensured that the path to homeownership remained closed to the majority of Black Americans. Unlike some of her white co-workers, who were approved for low-interest mortgages and able to move to the nearby suburbs, Big Mama and her progeny were confined to Atlanta’s renter class—spending ten years at an apartment at 949 Washington Street, located in the predominantly Black Peoplestown neighborhood, before relocating to East Lake Meadows in the early seventies.
In the public imagination, the 650-unit complex known as “Little Vietnam” was rampant with crime and violence, but Britt’s family spoke about it differently, as a place where people managed to forge a community despite living in terrible conditions. And the conditions were abysmal. Government neglect had plagued the project from the very beginning. Then, in the early nineties, Atlanta real estate titan Tom Cousins purchased the historic but derelict East Lake Golf Club, which bordered the housing project. Instead of advocating for the city to renovate the complex, he began calling for its demolition: his goal was to “rehabilitate” the neighborhood surrounding the golf course. Soon the complex was razed.
By 2001, when Britt was eight, the area had its first grocery store, a charter school, and The Villages of East Lake, a privately owned apartment complex built on the former site of East Lake Meadows. Cousins’s revived golf club became the annual host of the prestigious PGA TOUR Championship. The neighborhood’s rapid change was celebrated in media reports across the country, but not everyone benefited from it: because of strict eligibility requirements and the limited number of apartments set aside for low-income households, a mere 15 percent of the families residing at East Lake Meadows before its demolition were able to move into the new development. Granny and Big Mama, who died shortly after settling into her unit at the Villages, were among this select group. Cass and her kids were forced to go elsewhere.
A cold February wind cut through Britt’s outfit as she raced to catch the bus on Glenwood that would take her to MARTA’s Edgewood-Candler Park station and, from there, after transferring at Five Points, to the domestic terminal at Hartsfield-Jackson. As Britt rounded the corner, she saw that her bus was already approaching. She had to sprint to catch it.
It was only when she boarded the Gold line train at Five Points that Britt allowed herself to relax. She put in her earbuds and closed her eyes. The gentle opening notes of “Be Blessed” by Yolanda Adams—first an unadorned piano, then the deep, resonant tones of a gospel organ—began to settle her nerves. Prone to minor panic attacks, Britt had come up with strategies to stave off such episodes. Although she didn’t consider herself religious, listening to this song had a way of grounding her. It was as if Adams were an older, wiser friend, perfectly aware of Britt’s traumas and regrets but steadfast in the conviction that she need not be defined by them.
I want you to be blessed, don’t live life in distress
Just let go, let God, He’ll work it out for you
I pray that your soul will be blessed
Forever in His hands, for you deserve His best, no less.
Britt played the song twice and, when it ended, realized there was only one stop left before she arrived at the airport. As she had already done a number of times that day, she checked her email. She wasn’t expecting to see the message she’d been waiting for, but she still felt a pang of disappointment when it wasn’t there.
Flyboy in the Buttermilk:
1
Britt scrutinized her face in the bathroom mirror, hoping she looked less tired than she felt. Sleep had been hard to come by since she began working the closing shift at Low Country, a “new Southern cuisine” restaurant at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport. Some nights, after a grinding hour-plus commute from the airport back to her great-grandmother’s apartment in Atlanta’s East Lake neighborhood, she managed to crawl into bed beside her two-year-old son, Kyrie, and four-year-old daughter, Desiree, without waking them. Last night she was not so lucky: Kyrie stirred and Britt was up with him until well past midnight. No sooner had they finally drifted off than Britt’s phone alarm sounded, and it was all she could do to get the kids dressed and fed by six o’clock, when their daycare van arrived. Now, seven hours later, she massaged cocoa butter moisturizer onto her cheeks and forehead. Good enough, she thought with a sigh.
“Britt!” her great-grandmother bellowed over a television commercial. “Don’t forget to tidy up my living room before you leave!” Britt examined herself one last time. She hadn’t been able to wash her line-cook uniform between the previous night’s shift and the one she would be starting shortly, but the stains weren’t too noticeable.
For five months, Britt and her kids had been living out of several oversized tote bags in a corner of the apartment’s compact living room, next to the pullout sofa bed they shared. An ironclad rule at Granny’s apartment was that you pick up after yourself, and as Britt rushed to fold their clothes and blankets, she tried to arrange everything as neatly as possible. She had never asked Granny for a closet or dresser drawer in which to keep these items, in part because it seemed like there wasn’t any room to spare—the older woman had a propensity to squirrel away whatever toy or child’s sweater or pajama set she thought could be handed down to the family’s newest members—but mostly because she needed to believe that their stay at her apartment was only temporary. For her part, Granny made it clear in her own loving but not particularly subtle way that she was in no need of roommates. Britt described it to a friend as a “don’t get too comfortable” situation.
After reassembling the sofa bed and arranging its cushions, Britt hurried into the kitchen to finish preparing the kids’ dinner for later: chicken tenders, rice, green peas, and Pillsbury Crescent Rolls. She glanced at Granny, perched in her rocking chair a few feet away from the TV. Britt often marveled at the disconnect between this kindly arthritic woman, who passed the hours glued to Judge Mathis or Tyler Perry’s Madea movies while clutching her large-print Bible, and the stories she’d grown up hearing about her. Britt’s favorite photo of Granny from her younger years showed a scowling, self-professed hustler outside Butler’s Shoes in downtown Atlanta, sporting an all-white Levi’s denim suit with a smart red bow tie. These days the sole vestige of Granny’s former self was her fierce independence, which a recent diagnosis of Alzheimer’s had done little to diminish.
“Girl, it’s almost one-thirty. Shouldn’t you be on your way?” Britt hadn’t noticed her mom, Cass—short for Cassandra—enter the apartment. As always, the forty-three-year-old had a brusque, tightly coiled energy. She greeted Granny with a quick kiss on the top of her head.
“I’m making food for Des and Kyrie,” Britt replied. “If you could just throw it in the microwave when they get back—”
Cass cut her off. “What? You think I can’t put together some nuggets for my grandchildren?” She said this playfully, if a bit defensively. For a brief moment Britt stared at her, as if there was a lot she could say in response. “You get going and let me handle this,” Cass said.
At the front door, beside Granny’s “wall of fame,” where dozens of pictures taken at graduations and proms and athletic events had been assembled, Britt put on a thin, stylish camouflage-print jacket. “Where’s your coat at?” Cass yelled from the kitchen. “You know how cold it is? Why don’t you step out on that patio and find out.”
“Oh, she thinks she too cute for a puffy jacket,” Granny teased.
“Well, her ass is gonna freeze,” Cass said. The two women laughed. Britt, grinning, said, “Yeah, yeah,” and shut the door behind her.
Outside, Britt headed toward the bus stop on Glenwood Avenue. She had been walking this route since she was a toddler. Granny’s apartment building was a stone’s throw from the public housing project where Britt had spent the first few years of her life. Five generations of the family had lived together at East Lake Meadows. That had not been the plan. When Granny’s mother—“Big Mama,” as everyone called her—landed a job at an Atlanta printing factory in 1961, her hope was to eventually purchase her own house. But this was before the Fair Housing Act was signed into law. A century of housing discrimination ensured that the path to homeownership remained closed to the majority of Black Americans. Unlike some of her white co-workers, who were approved for low-interest mortgages and able to move to the nearby suburbs, Big Mama and her progeny were confined to Atlanta’s renter class—spending ten years at an apartment at 949 Washington Street, located in the predominantly Black Peoplestown neighborhood, before relocating to East Lake Meadows in the early seventies.
In the public imagination, the 650-unit complex known as “Little Vietnam” was rampant with crime and violence, but Britt’s family spoke about it differently, as a place where people managed to forge a community despite living in terrible conditions. And the conditions were abysmal. Government neglect had plagued the project from the very beginning. Then, in the early nineties, Atlanta real estate titan Tom Cousins purchased the historic but derelict East Lake Golf Club, which bordered the housing project. Instead of advocating for the city to renovate the complex, he began calling for its demolition: his goal was to “rehabilitate” the neighborhood surrounding the golf course. Soon the complex was razed.
By 2001, when Britt was eight, the area had its first grocery store, a charter school, and The Villages of East Lake, a privately owned apartment complex built on the former site of East Lake Meadows. Cousins’s revived golf club became the annual host of the prestigious PGA TOUR Championship. The neighborhood’s rapid change was celebrated in media reports across the country, but not everyone benefited from it: because of strict eligibility requirements and the limited number of apartments set aside for low-income households, a mere 15 percent of the families residing at East Lake Meadows before its demolition were able to move into the new development. Granny and Big Mama, who died shortly after settling into her unit at the Villages, were among this select group. Cass and her kids were forced to go elsewhere.
A cold February wind cut through Britt’s outfit as she raced to catch the bus on Glenwood that would take her to MARTA’s Edgewood-Candler Park station and, from there, after transferring at Five Points, to the domestic terminal at Hartsfield-Jackson. As Britt rounded the corner, she saw that her bus was already approaching. She had to sprint to catch it.
It was only when she boarded the Gold line train at Five Points that Britt allowed herself to relax. She put in her earbuds and closed her eyes. The gentle opening notes of “Be Blessed” by Yolanda Adams—first an unadorned piano, then the deep, resonant tones of a gospel organ—began to settle her nerves. Prone to minor panic attacks, Britt had come up with strategies to stave off such episodes. Although she didn’t consider herself religious, listening to this song had a way of grounding her. It was as if Adams were an older, wiser friend, perfectly aware of Britt’s traumas and regrets but steadfast in the conviction that she need not be defined by them.
I want you to be blessed, don’t live life in distress
Just let go, let God, He’ll work it out for you
I pray that your soul will be blessed
Forever in His hands, for you deserve His best, no less.
Britt played the song twice and, when it ended, realized there was only one stop left before she arrived at the airport. As she had already done a number of times that day, she checked her email. She wasn’t expecting to see the message she’d been waiting for, but she still felt a pang of disappointment when it wasn’t there.
Flyboy in the Buttermilk:
[2015 Reprint edition of 1992 classic]
"Greg Tate was my first, and in some ways truest, North Star . . . Greg was the first person who validated the art that I loved and made it intellectually viable." ―Questlove, from the foreword
"The velocity and volume of his exuberance, his demands, his curiosities, and, yes, his vibrant dissatisfactions pulled me to the edge of my chair." ―Hanif Absurraqib, from the introduction
A reissue of Pulitzer Prize winner Greg Tate's classic, out-of-print collection of essays, with a new introduction by Hanif Abdurraqib and a new foreword by Questlove.
From one of the most original, creative, and provocative culture critics comes an eye-opening collection of essays and tales about American music and culture.
Under the guise of writing about a single subject, Greg Tate’s essays in Flyboy in the Buttermilk branch out from his usual and explore social, pop cultural, political, and economic subjects. Taking on a wide diversity of topics―from the rise of hip-hop; the art of Jean-Michel Basquiat; the music of Miles Davis, James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, Bad Brains, and many others; to the crisis of the Black intellectual and the irony of the GOP recruiting Black Americans― Tate writes in a brave and distinctive voice that is angry, joyous, anxious, and funny.
In every piece of this collection, Tate offers informed insight into where America is going and why.
REVIEWS:
"[Tate's] language – cribbed from literature, academia, popular culture and hip-hop – was as influential as the content of his ideas. His aesthetic, innovations and intellectual originality, particularly in his pioneering hip-hop criticism, continue to influence subsequent generations, especially writers and critics of color."
"The velocity and volume of his exuberance, his demands, his curiosities, and, yes, his vibrant dissatisfactions pulled me to the edge of my chair." ―Hanif Absurraqib, from the introduction
A reissue of Pulitzer Prize winner Greg Tate's classic, out-of-print collection of essays, with a new introduction by Hanif Abdurraqib and a new foreword by Questlove.
From one of the most original, creative, and provocative culture critics comes an eye-opening collection of essays and tales about American music and culture.
Under the guise of writing about a single subject, Greg Tate’s essays in Flyboy in the Buttermilk branch out from his usual and explore social, pop cultural, political, and economic subjects. Taking on a wide diversity of topics―from the rise of hip-hop; the art of Jean-Michel Basquiat; the music of Miles Davis, James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, Bad Brains, and many others; to the crisis of the Black intellectual and the irony of the GOP recruiting Black Americans― Tate writes in a brave and distinctive voice that is angry, joyous, anxious, and funny.
In every piece of this collection, Tate offers informed insight into where America is going and why.
REVIEWS:
"[Tate's] language – cribbed from literature, academia, popular culture and hip-hop – was as influential as the content of his ideas. His aesthetic, innovations and intellectual originality, particularly in his pioneering hip-hop criticism, continue to influence subsequent generations, especially writers and critics of color."
―Pulitzer Prize citation
“I stole [my roommate’s copy] for a while till I got my own, which across the decades has become one of a handful of books I regularly pull off the shelf just to soak in a few paragraphs and juice the brain up into writing mode . . . With its re-humanizing sprezzatura that always unveils the power grid beneath the everyday as well as the personal stakes in the systemic, [Flyboy in the Buttermilk] is a handbook for preserving your own wild sanity under the terrordome. You should pilfer it from your best friend’s bookshelf posthaste.”
–Carl Wilson, Bookforum
“A new reissue of Greg Tate’s 1992 essay collection hits hard with the truth, again and again . . . Tate hit as hard as the music he wrote about, and his columns were often more important than his topics . . . the beauty of Tate, especially this bag of uncut gems, is that he was not a theorist of a unified field or a strict logician―or even an underdog . . .
Maybe the most distinct pleasure available here is the palpable truth that Tate was not auditioning for another job . . . [he] didn’t engage with culture with that sort of rueful magazine approach, the clucks-over-the-sad-brutality-of-America-but-hey-what-an-album pellet so much writing is cubed into. Tate knew the brutality is there every time the one comes back around. He just wanted everyone to get up.”
–Sasha Frere-Jones, 4Columns
“This new edition of Tate’s essay collection . . . reminds readers how wonderful it is to have this long-out-of-print book available again, as it is one of the first and most influential books that helped to define a modern Black aesthetic . . . More than just a time capsule, the book acts as a primer for being a critic. Jean-Michel Basquiat, Miles Davis, Samuel R. Delany, Public Enemy, De La Soul, Spike Lee, and Amiri Baraka are all discussed here, seen through Tate’s clear, critical eye . . . [T]his reissue restores a blueprint for criticism in the 21st century. VERDICT: The cultural gravity of this book makes it an essential part of any library on Black aesthetics, music criticism, and art criticism.”
–John Rodzvilla, Library Journal
"A singular voice, a fount of bravura essays on the fantastical creativity, determined resilience and wry paradoxes of Black creativity and life . . . His writing froze and shattered time, supercharged neurons, unraveled familiar knots and tied up beautiful new ones . . . he affected every writer I cared about and learned from ― we’re all Tate’s children."
―Jon Caramanica, The New York Times
"[It's] hard to explain the impact that Flyboy in the Buttermilk had on a whole generation of young writers and critics who read every page of it like scripture. It’s still a clinic on literary brilliance"
―Jelani Cobb, staff writer at The New Yorker and author of Three Or More Is a Riot: Notes on How We Got Here: 2012-2025
"[Tate's] best paragraphs throbbed like a party and chattered like a salon; they were stylishly jam-packed with names and reference points that shouldn’t have got along but did . . . What made Tate’s criticism special was his ability to theorize outward from his encounters with genius and his brushes with banality―to telescope between moments of artistic inspiration and the giant structures within which those moments were produced."
―Hua Hsu, The New Yorker
"A writer who'd not only mastered the mode of writing to which I aspired, but had reinvented it, right down to the vocabulary, so that music criticism became music itself."
―Ann Powers, NPR
"To call Greg Tate one of the most important critics and essayists of the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries, in any language, would not be an exaggeration. In fact, it would not be enough."
―Robin D.G. Kelley, Boston Review
"He looked knowingly to our tears and offered us a salve in the massive wonder of epic sentences that captured the full scale of both our sorrow and the undying enchantment that lives on in the music."
―Daphne A. Brooks, Bookforum
"Tate taught many of us how to write and even to think―musically, improvisationally, poetically . . . Tate’s cultural criticism has long served as a North Star for those championing artistic freedom, cultural complexity and Black excellence."
―Kevin Young, Director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Greg Tate (1957–2021) was a music and popular-culture critic and journalist whose work appeared in many publications, including The Village Voice, Vibe, Spin, The Wire, and Downbeat. He was the author of Flyboy in the Buttermilk: Essays on Contemporary America and Midnight Lightning: Jimi Hendrix and the Black Experience and the editor of Everything but the Burden: What White People Are Taking from Black Culture. He won a posthumous Pulitzer Prize in 2024 in recognition of his pioneering work. Tate, via guitar and baton, also led the conducted improvisation ensemble Burnt Sugar the Arkestra Chamber, which toured internationally.
