In-House Materials

So You Want to Talk About Race

Goodreads Review:

In this breakout book, Ijeoma Oluo explores the complex reality of today's racial landscape--from white privilege and police brutality to systemic discrimination and the Black Lives Matter movement--offering straightforward clarity that readers need to contribute to the dismantling of the racial divide

In So You Want to Talk About Race, Editor at Large of The Establishment Ijeoma Oluo offers a contemporary, accessible take on the racial landscape in America, addressing head-on such issues as privilege, police brutality, intersectionality, micro-aggressions, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the "N" word. Perfectly positioned to bridge the gap between people of color and white Americans struggling with race complexities, Oluo answers the questions readers don't dare ask, and explains the concepts that continue to elude everyday Americans.

Oluo is an exceptional writer with a rare ability to be straightforward, funny, and effective in her coverage of sensitive, hyper-charged issues in America. Her messages are passionate but finely tuned, and crystalize ideas that would otherwise be vague by empowering them with aha-moment clarity. Her writing brings to mind voices like Ta-Nehisi Coates and Roxane Gay, and Jessica Valenti in Full Frontal Feminism, and a young Gloria Naylor, particularly in Naylor's seminal essay "The Meaning of a Word."

Some Assembly Required

Goodreads Review:

Seventeen-year-old Arin Andrews shares all the hilarious, painful, and poignant details of undergoing gender reassignment as a high school student in this winning memoir. We've all felt uncomfortable in our own skin at some point, and we've all been told that it's just a part of growing up. But for Arin Andrews, it wasn't a phase that would pass. He had been born in the body of a girl and there seemed to be no relief in sight. In this revolutionary memoir, Arin details the journey that led him to make the life-transforming decision to undergo gender reassignment as a high school junior. In his captivatingly witty, honest voice, Arin reveals the challenges he faced as a girl, the humiliation and anger he felt after getting kicked out of his private school, and all the changes, both mental and physical, he experienced once his transition began. Arin also writes about the thrill of meeting and dating a young transgender woman named Katie Hill and the heartache that followed after they broke up.

Some Assembly Required is a true coming-of-age story about knocking down obstacles and embracing family, friendship, and first love. But more than that, it is a reminder that self-acceptance does not come ready-made with a manual and spare parts. Rather, some assembly is always required.

Xwist Memin Kin "I Want to Go Home"

Goodreads Review:

Personal memories of people, routines, rules and education at an Indian residential school are outlined. It is a very different picture when compared with home life and family visits. The Government of Canada intended to separate children from parents, traditions, language and spiritual beliefs, but these were the very things that saved and nurtured Nk'xetko, Mary Jane Joe.

"By describing my twelve years of suffering at the school, year by year and grade by grade I realized that the strengths that held me together and gave me the courage to survive and finish school were the teachings of my parents and grandmother. I never said thank you to them. They have passed away but their love and resilience live on. This book is a belated kwuks chemxw, thank you my dear family."

The Savy Ally

Goodreads Review:

The Savvy Ally: A Guide for Becoming a Skilled LGBTQ+ Advocate is an enjoyable, humorous, encouraging, easy to understand guidebook for being an ally to the LGBTQ+ communities. It is chock full of practical and useful tools for LGBTQ+ advocacy, including:

- Current and relevant information on identities and LGBTQ+ language

- Tips for what to say and what not to say when someone comes out to you.

- LGBTQ+ etiquette and techniques for respectful conversations

- Common bloopers to avoid

- Tools for effectively navigating difficult conversations

- Suggestions for addressing common questions and concerns

- Actions for creating more LGBTQ+ inclusive spaces

- Recommendations for self-care and sustainable allyship

This book will be useful for teachers, counselors, social workers, nurses, medical technicians, and college professors, as well as parents who want to be supportive of their LGBTQ+ child, but don't know how. This is not a book about why to be an ally. This is a book about how to be an ally. The goal of The Savvy Ally is to create more confident, active allies who are effective advocates for change. This informative, entertaining, and supportive guidebook will surely jump-start even the most tentative ally.

Decolonize First

Decolonize First, a liberating guide & workbook by Ta7talíya Michelle Nahanee features 14 letter-size pages of process, prompts and links to resources to support your decolonizing journey. The workbook guides readers through personal and systemic framings and actions to shift out of colonial defaults and into critical consciousness.Inspired by Ta7talíya’s experience in hosting decolonizing dialogues using her giant Sínulkhay & Ladders board game, Decolonize First, responds to the activation and excitement workshop participants express as wanting to do more. This workbook provides space and tools for the self-reflection and preparation needed to peel back the layers of neocolonialism that impede all of us.

Decolonize...

Decolonize... is Ta7talíya Michelle Nahanee’s second 14-page decolonial workbook is designed to be a recalibrating guide and workbook to deconstruct everyday cultural norms that impact us. Colonial narratives, expectations and approaches impede our true success, but critical awareness and self-design can help us recalibrate our meanings and actions.

Decolonize... shares real-life decolonizing practices for language, relations, accountability, professionalism, work-life balance, wellness, perfectionism, ideology & identity. This colourful, meaningful offering from Ta7talíya builds on the foundations of her Decolonize First workbook with explainers and graphic organizers to recalibrate how colonialism impacts us every day.