Alumnae Virtual Book Club Continues

Alumnae gathered for conversation around the book you've probably heard about Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Pulitzer Prize winner Isabel Wilkerson. Over two evenings, the group reflected on WIlkerson's research and analysis of caste dynamics and their relevance to racism, class, and caste in America.

 

The book club responded to the many metaphors Wilkerson uses to conceptualize the American caste system as well as the author's immersive narrative of real people throughout history. They also toiled with what it means to live in a country whose system of discrimination was established before the country itself. In conversation around the three major caste systems Wilkerson examines (India, Nazi Germany, and America) the book club had meaningful conversation and discovery in sharing their individual findings around the similarities, differences, and new understanding for caste.

"I had these thoughts while reading Isabel Wilkerson’s new book, “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents.” It’s an extraordinary document, one that strikes me as an instant American classic and almost certainly the keynote nonfiction book of the American century thus far. It made the back of my neck prickle from its first pages, and that feeling never went away."   - Dwight Garnerof the New York Times