Yo' Mama's Disfunktional! - (Beacon Classics) by Robin D G Kelley (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

From the celebrated author of Freedom Dreams, a thought-provoking look at how the multicolored urban working class are the solution--not the problem--to the ills of American cities

A limited Beacon Classics edition, with a gorgeous spot gloss cover and retro, classic palette

In this classic work, acclaimed historian Robin D. G. Kelley undermines false perceptions of Black culture to highlight how grassroots movements hold the key to revolutionizing urban America.

Starting with an insightful look at street culture--from the "dozens" to pick-up basketball--Kelley shows how these misunderstandings of Black culture are at the center of the failure of public policy, scholarship and social movements to save our cities. He critiques both conservatives and liberals for ignoring what these cultural forms mean for their practitioners. Blending wit, intellect, and historical detail, he offers groundbreaking analyses of the multicultural roots of Black urban culture and the mistakes of the labor movement in denying the importance of cultural factors.

With Kelley's crucial insights as timely now as when they were first published, this repackaged edition of Yo' Mama's Disfunktional! shows how the most heartening progress toward a better future for urban America is revealed in urban grassroots movements.

Review Quotes

It is not too much or too early to call Robin D. G. Kelley a leading black historian of the age. But it may not be enough. --Paul Buhle, Monthly Review

"Kelley's crafted a funny, fast-paced tour of recent and long-standing debates about the quality, form, and function of black life, an interdisciplinary performance that has him kicking up dust across all kinds of boundaries. . . . Kelley doesn't skimp on historical detail or intellectual rigor; best of all, he can play the dozens with the best of them." --The Village Voice Literary Supplement

"Readers of Yo' Mama's Disfunktional! are...compelled by the strength of Kelley's arguments to identify and/or re-think their positions in the contemporary 'culture wars' fray." -- Diverse: Issues in Higher Education

"Dr. Kelley has provided us with a vast and still growing corpus of intellectual thought and production...He shows us that by taking dreams seriously, we better position ourselves to articulate and actualize our affirmative political demands in the present." -- Dr. Orisanmi Burton, author of Tip of the Spear: Black Radicalism, Prison Repression, and the Long Attica Revolt

"A salvo in response to the latest conservative efforts to mine the familiar battery of statistics in search of proof that African-Americans belong at the bottom of society. Kelley, a historian, turns his considerable skill toward public policy and perceptions." --William Jelani Cobb, Emerge

"Robin Kelley writes about culture, politics, Negrocons, disgruntled former leftists, and contemporary activists with intelligence, passion, insight, and great humor. This important, fluid book makes it clear that Kelley's genius is his ability to bring complex ideas down to earth and simultaneously make them transcendent." --Jill Nelson, author of Straight, No Chaser: How I Became a Grown-Up Black Woman

"Robin Kelley is a major new voice on the intellectual left. In this book, he argues with authority and intelligence that the familiar babble of rhetoric opposing identity politics to class politics is mistaken. Instead, muliculturalism should be viewed as part of the fabric of a strong class movement." --Frances Fox Piven, author of The Breaking of the American Social Contract

About the Author

Robin D. G. Kelley is Distinguished Professor and Gary B. Nash Endowed Chair in US History at UCLA. He is author or co-editor of numerous award-winning books, including Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original, Yo' Mama's Disfunktional! Fighting the Culture Wars in Urban America, and Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class, among others.