Beverly Daniel Tatum: Why Are All of the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?

We LOVE this book!

This blog post is a bit unusual: rather than a written post, enjoy this video program presented in partnership with the Chicago Humanities Festival and the Center for the Study of Race, Politics & Culture at the University of Chicago.

Walk into any racially mixed high school and you will see Black, White, and Latino youth clustered in their own groups. Is self-segregation a coping strategy or a problem? Twenty years ago, in Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? Beverly Daniel Tatum, a renowned authority on the psychology of racism, brought a complicated argument to the table: an appreciation of racial identity formation as essential to any potential communication across racial and ethnic differences.

In this compelling interview, Tatum discusses why we're apart when we're together.