Traveling Black: A Story of Race and Resistance

Today’s nonfiction post is on Traveling Black: A Story of Race and Resistance by Mia Bay. It is 391 pages long and is published by Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. The cover is an illustration of different ways of travel from cars to buses. The intended reader is someone who is interested in African American history. There is foul language, no sex, and discussion of violence in this book. There Be Spoilers Ahead.

From the dust jacket- A riveting, character-rich account of racial segregation in America that reveals just how central travel restrictions were to the creation of Jim Crow laws--and why "traveling Black" has been at the heart of the quest for racial justice ever since.

Why have white supremacists and Black activists been so focused on Black mobility? From Plessy v. Ferguson to #DrivingWhileBlack, African Americans have fought for over a century to move freely around the United States. Curious as to why so many cases contesting the doctrine of "separate but equal" involved trains and buses, Mia Bay went back to the sources with some basic questions: How did travel segregation begin? Why were so many of those who challenged it in court women? How did it move from one form of transport to another, and what was it like to be caught up in this web of contradictory rules?

From stagecoaches and trains to buses, cars, and planes, Traveling Black explores when, how, and why racial restrictions took shape and brilliantly portrays what it was like to live with them. "There is not in the world a more disgraceful denial of human brotherhood than the 'Jim Crow' car of the southern United States," W. E. B. Du Bois famously declared. Bay unearths troves of supporting evidence, rescuing forgotten stories of undaunted passengers who made it back home despite being insulted, stranded, re-routed, or ignored.

Black travelers never stopped challenging these humiliations and insisting on justice in the courts. Traveling Black upends our understanding of Black resistance, documenting a sustained fight that falls outside the traditional boundaries of the civil rights movement. A masterpiece of scholarly and human insight, this book helps explain why the long, unfinished journey to racial equality so often takes place on the road.

Review- A very interesting and engaging read about travel discrimination that African Americans have dealt with and continue to do so. Bay has done extensive research into her topic and it shows in this book. We start at the end of the Civil War when the newly freed slaves started moving around in society without a white person or permission from anyone. Over the course of the book, we travel with very famous people to more normal citizens who are all dealing with extreme unfairness and prejudice. Bay covers the topics with respect but she does not soften the harsh truths of traveling black. I would recommend this book. 

I give this book a Four out of Five stars. I get nothing for my review and I borrowed this book from my local library.