How to Be a (Young) Antiracist

By Ibram X. Kendi and Nic Stone

The #1 New York Times bestseller that sparked international dialogue is now a book for young adults! Based on the adult bestseller by Ibram X. Kendi, and co-authored by bestselling author Nic Stone, How to be a (Young) Antiracist will serve as a guide for teens seeking a way forward in acknowledging, identifying, and dismantling racism and injustice.

The New York Times bestseller How to be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi is shaping the way a generation thinks about race and racism. How to be a (Young) Antiracist is a dynamic reframing of the concepts shared in the adult book, with young adulthood front and center. Aimed at readers 12 and up, and co-authored by award-winning children's book author Nic Stone, How to be a (Young) Antiracist empowers teen readers to help create a more just society. Antiracism is a journey--and now young adults will have a map to carve their own path. Kendi and Stone have revised this work to provide anecdotes and data that speaks directly to the experiences and concerns of younger readers, encouraging them to think critically and build a more equitable world in doing so.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
• Release date: Jan 31, 2023
• ISBN: 9780593461624

Ibram X. Kendi

Ibram X. Kendi is a National Book Award–winning and #1 New York Times bestselling author. His books include Antiracist Baby; Goodnight Racism; How to Be an Antiracist; and How to Raise an Antiracist. Kendi was the Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University and the Director of the BU Center for Antiracist Research for five years, before leaving to become Director of the Howard University Institute for Advanced Study in 2025. In 2020, Time magazine named Kendi one of the 100 most influential people in the world. He was also awarded a 2021 MacArthur Fellowship.

Book preview

Cover for How to Be a (Young) Antiracist, Author, Ibram X. Kendi and Nic StoneBook Title, How to Be a (Young) Antiracist, Author, Ibram X. Kendi and Nic Stone, Imprint, Kokila

KOKILA

An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, New York

First published in the United States of America by Kokila,

an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2023

Copyright © 2023 by Ibram X. Kendi and Logolepsy Media Inc.

Adapted from How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi, published in 2019 by One World

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Kendi, Ibram X., author. | Stone, Nic, author.

Title: How to be a (young) antiracist | by Dr. Ibram X. Kendi and Nic Stone.

Description: New York: Kokila, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2022.

Audience: Ages: 12–15 | Audience: Grades: 7–9

Summary: The #1 New York Times bestseller that sparked international dialogue is now a book for young adults! Based on the adult bestseller by Ibram X. Kendi, and co-authored by bestselling author Nic Stone, How to Be a (Young) Antiracist will serve as a guide for teens seeking a way forward in acknowledging, identifying, and dismantling racism and injustice— Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2022000891 | ISBN 9780593461600 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593461624 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Anti-racism—United States—Juvenile literature. | Youth—Political activity—United States—Juvenile literature. | Racial justice—United States—Juvenile literature.

Classification: LCC E184.A1 .K343 2022 | DDC 305.800973—dc23/eng/20220615

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022000891.

ISBN 9780593461600

ISBN 9780593529232 (INTERNATIONAL EDITION)

ISBN 9780593461624 (EBOOK)

Cover art © 2023

Lettering by Adrian Meadows

Illustration by Octavia Ink

Design by Theresa Evangelista Design by Jasmin Rubero, adapted for ebook by Michelle Quintero

This is a work of nonfiction. Some names and identifying details have been changed.

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

pid_prh_6.0_148340210_c0_r0

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

A Brief Word Before We Begin . . .

Beginning in the Middle: Your (Racist) Introduction

Part One | Inside: Facing Ourselves

1. Definitions: Why They Matter (Just Like Black Lives Do)

2. Of Two Minds: Dueling Consciousness

3. Power (Aka: The Thing That Makes Race a Thing)

4. Biology

5. Behavior

6. Black (Aka: The Chapter Where We Start Talking About the N-Word)

7. White

Part Two | Outside: Facing the World

8. Color

9. Ethnicity

10. Body

11. Gender

12. Orientation

13. Class

14. Culture

15. Space

Part Three | Upside Down: Flipping the World Over

16. Failure → Success

17. The Four C’s of Changemaking: Cogency, Compassion, Creativity, Collaboration

18. Survival

The Beginning

Afterword

Nic Stone’s Acknowledgments

Ibram X. Kendi’s Acknowledgments

Endnotes

About the Author

_148340210_

For the foolishly optimistic.

We will win. Eventually.

—I. X. K. and N. S.

A Brief Word before We Begin . . .

As I’m sure you’ve deduced from that whole "Inspired by the #1 New York Times bestseller How to Be an Antiracist" statement on the cover, this book is . . . inspired by the #1 New York Times bestseller How to Be an Antiracist, the paradigm-shifting memoir written by Dr. Ibram X. Kendi.

And the inspired by is very important. Because this book is structured differently than its source of inspiration. Hence me, your beloved narrator, Nic Stone, including this pre-intro as a bit of a road map for the nonlinear journey you’re about to take through Dr. Kendi’s life.

Said journey is broken up into three parts (or acts, if we want to get all narratively fancy with it):

INSIDE: Facing Yourself

The concepts covered here—definitions, dueling consciousness, power, biology, behavior, Black, and White—are all about turning inward and are focused on examining the paradigms, aka foundational thoughts and ideas, that form our views of ourselves and other people.

OUTSIDE: Facing the World

Once we’ve done some self-examination and rejiggering, it’ll be time to turn outward and take a microscopic-level look into the ways that racism permeates the world we live in and intersects with other forms of people being awful to each other. We’re talking color, ethnicity, body, gender, orientation, class, culture, and space.

UPSIDE DOWN: Flipping the World Over

This is where we get about that action, boss. We’re moving from failure to success and digging into what I—Nic—call the Four C’s of Changemaking: cogency, compassion, creativity, and collaboration. We’ll also make sure we have a solid grip on the power of pushing forward in spite of obstacles. And I know that a lot of you readers feel like you’re ready to get out there and tear down the vile walls of racism, so, like, why not just jump to this section first, right?

Well, you could, obviously . . .

But in my humble opinion, it would behoove you to read the other two sections first.

Because as you, dear reader, will come to discover, being antiracist is more than a quick and easy decision you make. (And you don’t have to make it right now, by the way. Do yourself—and the world—a favor by reading the book first.)

Being antiracist is . . . Well, I won’t spoil it.

Just buckle up and get ready for the ride.

BEGINNING IN THE MIDDLE:

Your (Racist) Introduction

The year is 2000, and you, Ibram X. Kendi, are seventeen years old.

You hate wearing suits. And ties.

Hate it.

Today, though, you’re in a suit and tie—black button-down, black slacks, golden-brown blazer, slick boots the color of the half-and-half you’ve seen adults pour into coffee, and the brightest, boldest tie you could find. You’re also standing somewhere you never expected to be, about to do something you never expected to do.

It’s your senior year of high school, and you’re mere months from graduation. Getting there felt like a hard-fought battle with one arm tied behind your back. So being here? In this chapel with upward of three thousand people seated in rows that curve around the long, arched pulpit, all waiting to hear what YOU have to say? Flanked by two other Black high schoolers also dressed to the nines and waiting for their turns at the mic?

Yeah, this feels real good.

It’s the perfect cap to a series of events that turned your world—both outer and inner, your sense of yourself and your capabilities—completely upside down. True, your competitors in the final round of the Prince William County Martin Luther King Jr. Oratorical Contest are a lot (book) smarter than you are. They certainly get better grades than the ones that make up your sub-3.0 GPA. And their SAT scores are hundreds of points higher than yours. You barely cracked 1000 . . .

But you are here, just like they are.

You won your high school oratorical competition, as you presume they did. You moved on to a countywide round, which they did as well. You were voted best before the judge, which is how you wound up right here beside them on this makeshift stage.

And the best part: Just like them, you’re headed to college.

Now, this might not sound like a huge deal—obviously, you’re eventually going to college, right? Your parents both went, and from what you’ve heard, that’s what all smart people do after graduating from high school. No-brainer.

The truth is, though, for a while you didn’t feel very smart. You’d dropped out of your IB English class because you couldn’t get your head around Shakespeare. There’s no way I’m smart enough for a university, you thought.

But being on this stage isn’t the first time you’ve been proven wrong about yourself. And as you’ll soon come to discover, the fiery speech you’re about to give is only the beginning.

The whole college thing had come as a huge surprise: A few weeks prior, you’d been minding your basketball business, running layup lines during a typical pre–home game warm-up session. Catch the pass, dribble forward, then gently leap and let the ball roll off your fingertips. Run to the opposite line and repeat.

But then the gym door opened, and in strode your dear ol’ dad. Six-foot-three and two hundred pounds. Waltzed right onto the court, long arms waving to get your attention.

Your gut reaction: wide-eyed, breath-stopping embarrassment. As much as you love your pops, his blasé-blah attitude toward what you’ll eventually come to call the White judge—a personified name for the overwhelming sense that power-bearing White people are evaluating your every move . . . something Dad couldn’t care less about—really got under your skin back then. Prevent his true feelings from showing on his face? Nope. Keep his voice down? No way. Avoid making any sort of scene? Forget about it.

It scared you to have an African American father who lived by his own rules. It was the precise type of attitude that might’ve gotten him lynched in the past or shot down by a vigilante civilian or law enforcement official now.

But at any rate, there he was. So you jogged over to meet him.

He looked really geeked. Which was weird.

When you reached him, he handed you an envelope. Told you to open it. Like . . . right then and there at the half-court line before a game. With everybody watching. Including all the White people.

Of course, you complied.

It was an acceptance letter from Hampton University, one of the two colleges you’d applied to for the sole purpose of being able to say you’d tried.

That acceptance letter flipped your worldview on its head. Despite the test scores and report cards, you were smart enough to go to college after all. The other school you applied to, Florida A&M University, is the one you’ll wind up attending, so you clearly got in there too (though you don’t know that yet).

Standing on that court in front of your dad, a number of faulty ideas faded from your mind. So did your sense of what you would later come to know as the White gaze. With that letter in your hand, the stuff you believed about intelligence being proven by grades and test scores? It lost a bit of its validity.

Granted, you’ve still got a lot of ideas to unlearn and replace. You’re not yet a reader, but you will be soon. And eventually, you’ll look back and see a number of things through a cleaner lens.

But this moment on the basketball court is one you won’t forget. It’s the moment you awaken to the idea of something . . . more.

Now back to the MLK oratorical contest. You’re up first.

And before you begin, you should know: You’ll come to recall the speech you’re about to give with . . . the opposite of pride.

For now, though, you’re fired up. Ready to roll. Primed and pumped to share what you think is an updated version of Dr. King’s dream.

So you take your place, and you begin.

"What would be Dr. King’s message for the millennium?

Let’s visualize an angry seventy-one-year-old Dr. King . . .

[It was joyous, our emancipation from enslavement . . . But . . .]

"Now, one hundred thirty-five years later, the Negro is still not free . . .

"Our youth’s minds are still in captivity!

"They* think it’s okay to be those who are most feared in our society!

*They as in Black youth.

"They think it’s okay not to think!

"They think it’s okay to climb the high tree of pregnancy!

They think it’s okay to confine their dreams to sports and music!

(Applause, applause, and more applause.)

"Their minds are being held captive, and our adults’ minds are right there beside them.

"Because they somehow think that the cultural revolution that began on the day of my dream’s birth is over.

How can it be over when many times we are unsuccessful because we lack intestinal fortitude?

(Everybody claps.)

How can it be over when our kids leave their houses not knowing how to make themselves, only knowing how to not make themselves?

(Everybody claps.)

How can it be over if all of this is happening in our community?

And then . . . with everyone at the edge of their seats, hanging on your every word, you drop your voice for the finale:

"So I say to you, my friends, that even though this cultural revolution may never be over,

I still have a dream . . .

And the crowd goes wild.

A crowd full of African American adults. (You’re in a Black church, after all.)

Validation.

But the thing is . . . you’re wrong. And everyone who agreed with you by way of applause is also wrong.

It’ll take you some time to realize that your words aren’t as virtuous as the resounding applause has made you believe they are. Eventually, you realize that it’ll take more than a surprise pair of college admission letters and a spot in the finals of an oratorical contest to shift your sense of yourself and other Black people.

In this moment, though, with the approval of Black men, women, and children ringing in your ears, you don’t realize it . . .

But everything you said is racist.

Later, you’ll wonder: Was it your poor sense of yourself that generated your poor sense of your people? Or was it your poor sense of your people that fueled your poor sense of yourself?

Both were evident in that speech.

For instance . . .

You mentioned our youth’s minds being in captivity . . . but what exactly are they in captivity to?

You mentioned Black youth’s okay-ness with being feared . . . but is that their fault alone?

Your mentioned Black youth being cool with not thinking . . . which is little more than a remix of the old adage that Black kids don’t value education as much as their non-Black counterparts. But is that actually true?

Number three is particularly insidious—a word you’ll come to use that basically means EVIL in a dastardly villain–type of way. Because it hasn’t occurred to you that even you had fallen prey to the precise thing you were shouting down. Remember your shock at getting into not one, but two colleges? Said shock came from your belief that you were a

Reviews for How to Be a (Young) Antiracist

[ewyatt_16 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The bestselling adult book, adapted for young people by Nic Stone, is written in a note to self style to Ibram X. Kendi. It traces his life experiences and the way he grew to understand racist and antiracist thinking. It delves into unlearning, breaks down the book into chapters about things like gender, class, space, and explores intersectionality. Lots of definitions, examples, asides from Nic Stone who adds a layer of her own perspective.
I found it to be an accessible read. It was a slow read to absorb the many ideas contained within the book. Sometimes the narrative structure got in the way but it was a clever way to share Kendi's life, work, and shifts in his own thinking and how he would have received the book as a young person.