Race. A four-letter word. The greatest social divide in American life, a half-century ago and today.
During that time, the U.S. has seen the most dramatic demographic and cultural shifts in its history, what can be called the colorization of America. But the same nation that elected its first Black president on a wave of hope—another four-letter word—is still plunged into endless culture wars.
How do Americans see race now? How has that changed—and not changed—over the half-century? After eras framed by words like "multicultural" and "post-racial," do we see each other any more clearly?
Who We Be remixes comic strips and contemporary art, campus protests and corporate marketing campaigns, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Trayvon Martin into a powerful, unusual, and timely cultural history of the idea of racial progress. In this follow-up to the award-winning classic Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation, Jeff Chang brings fresh energy, style, and sweep to the essential American story.

Table of Contents
Seeing America
Part 1: A New Culture, 1963-1979
Chapter 1 Rainbow Power: Morrie Turner and the Kids
Chapter 2 After Jericho: The Struggle against Invisibility
Chapter 3 "The Real Thing": Lifestyling and Its Discontents
Chapter 4 Every Man an Artist, Every Artist a Priest: The Invention of
Multiculturalism
Chapter 5 Color Theory: Race Trouble in the Avant-Garde

Part 2: Who Are We? 1980-1993
Chapter 6 The End of the World as We Know It: Whiteness, the Rainbow, and
the Culture Wars
Chapter 7 Unity and Reconciliation: The Era of Identity
Chapter 8 Imagine/Ever Wanting/To Be: The Fall of Multiculturalism
Chapter 9 All the Colors in the World: The Mainstreaming of Multiculturalism
Chapter 10 We Are All Multiculturalists Now: Visions of One America

Part 3: The Colorization of America, 1993-2013
Chapter 11 Post Time: Identity in the New Millennium
Chapter 12 Demographobia: Racial Fears and Colorized Futures
Chapter 13 The Wave: The Hope of a New Cultural Majority
Chapter 14 Dis/Union: The Paradox of the Post-Racial Moment
Chapter 15 Who We Be: Debt, Community, and Colorization

Dreaming America