Thick: And Other Essays
Thick: And Other Essays book cover

Thick: And Other Essays

by
Price
$13.99
Format
Hardcover
Pages
224
Publisher
The New Press
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-1620974360
Dimensions
5.6 x 1 x 8.7 inches
Weight
13.6 ounces

Description

Praise for Thick : Shortlisted for the Museum of African American History Stone Book Award " Thick is sure to become a classic of black intellectualism, one that ought to be read not only in African-American and gender studies departments across the country, although its lens is irrefutably and irresistibly black and feminist. It should be required reading for anyone interested in making 'trust black women' more than a hollow social media mantra."― The New York Times Book Review "Cottom's intersectionality is merely the work of a writer seeing the world clearly and deeply, and connecting the dots in fresh and revealing ways."― Chicago Tribune " Thick confirms McMillan Cottom as one of our most fearless public intellectuals and one of the most vital."― Literary Hub, "The 10 Best Essay Collections of the Decade" " Thick gets into the messiness of US culture, exposing what Americans want to say but are sometimes too afraid or too unaware to say. . . . In essence, this book is about the compromises we make for the sake of control." ― Christian Century "Incisive, witty, and provocative essays. . . . The collection showcases McMillan Cottom's wisdom and originality and amply fulfills her aim of telling powerful stories that become a problem for power."― Publishers Weekly (starred review) "The meshing of the personal and political and the author's take-no-prisoners attitude make these essays sizzle. A provocative volume bound to stir argument and discussion."― Kirkus Reviews "This book is essential for anyone who wants to think deeply about race, feminism, and culture."― BookRiot "To say this collection is transgressive, provocative, and brilliant is simply to tell you the truth. Thick is a necessary work and a reminder that Tressie McMillan Cottom is one of the finest public intellectuals writing today."― Roxane Gay, author of Hunger and Bad Feminist " Thick is gorgeous, incisive, and hard. Tressie McMillan Cottom is among America's most bracing thinkers on race, gender, and capitalism of our time and she is at her very best here. These essays enlighten and complicate and push conversations further. They are blisteringly smart and beautifully written. They are also, simply, a pleasure to read."― Rebecca Traister, author of Good and Mad and All the Single Ladies "Black women are uniquely attuned to the hydra that bell hooks names the imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy. Publics should trust black women. Thick proves why readers should trust Tressie McMillan Cottom's black-people-loving writing that is as deft as it is amusing. Her words are a sword. She comes out swinging her blade at the hydra's head with unmatched courage."― Darnell L. Moore, author of No Ashes in the Fire "These essays show us the potency of actually existing black feminist analysis and expose the deep structures of racism and inequality that shape most black women's lives. With biting humor and razor-sharp political clarity, Thick is a crucial contribution to contemporary black thought."― Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, author of From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation "Reading Thick is like holding a mirror to your soul and to that of America. [S]earingly intimate and astute . . . at once painfully honest and gloriously affirming."― Dorothy Roberts, author of Killing the Black Body "Rich with layers of meaning . . . blaaaaaack and southern and country and wise [and] pulsates with wit, self-awareness, and unabashed expertise. For Professional Smart People with sense, her writing is #goals."― Soraya McDonald, culture critic at The Undefeated " Thick is aptly named, for McMillan Cottom is no intellectual lightweight―she walks heavy, bringing together her singular sociological insights with compelling and relatable storytelling."― Brittney Cooper, author of Eloquent Rage Praise for Tressie McMillan Cottom's Lower Ed : "The best book yet on the complex lives and choices of for-profit students."― The New York Times Book Review Tressie McMillan Cottom is an associate professor of sociology at Virginia Commonwealth University and the author of Lower Ed and Thick (The New Press). Her work has been featured by the The Daily Show , the New York Times , the Washington Post , PBS, NPR, Fresh Air , and The Atlantic , among others. She lives in Richmond, Virginia.

Features & Highlights

  • FINALIST FOR THE 2019 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD
  • Named a notable book of 2019 by the
  • New York Times Book Review
  • ,
  • Chicago Tribune
  • ,
  • Time
  • , and
  • The Guardian
  • As featured by
  • The Daily Show
  • ,
  • NPR
  • ,
  • PBS
  • ,
  • CBC
  • ,
  • Time
  • ,
  • VIBE
  • ,
  • Entertainment
  • Weekly
  • ,
  • Well-Read Black Girl
  • , and Chris Hayes, "incisive, witty, and provocative essays" (
  • Publishers
  • Weekly
  • ) by one of the "most bracing thinkers on race, gender, and capitalism of our time" (Rebecca Traister)
  • “
  • Thick
  • is sure to become a classic.” —
  • The New York Times Book Review
  • In eight highly praised treatises on beauty, media, money, and more, Tressie McMillan Cottom—award-winning professor and acclaimed author of
  • Lower Ed
  • —is unapologetically "thick": deemed "thick where I should have been thin, more where I should have been less," McMillan Cottom refuses to shy away from blending the personal with the political, from bringing her full self and voice to the fore of her analytical work.
  • Thick
  • "transforms narrative moments into analyses of whiteness, black misogyny, and status-signaling as means of survival for black women" (
  • Los Angeles Review of Books
  • ) with "writing that is as deft as it is amusing" (Darnell L. Moore).
  • This "transgressive, provocative, and brilliant" (Roxane Gay) collection cements McMillan Cottom's position as a public thinker capable of shedding new light on what the "personal essay" can do. She turns her chosen form into a showcase for her critical dexterity, investigating everything from
  • Saturday Night Live
  • , LinkedIn, and BBQ Becky to sexual violence, infant mortality, and Trump rallies.
  • Collected in an indispensable volume that speaks to the everywoman and the erudite alike, these unforgettable essays never fail to be "painfully honest and gloriously affirming" and hold "a mirror to your soul and to that of America" (Dorothy Roberts).

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
60%
(887)
★★★★
25%
(370)
★★★
15%
(222)
★★
7%
(104)
★
-7%
(-104)

Most Helpful Reviews

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Powerful and important book

This book of essays is stunning and stellar and needed during this era. Dr. Cottom exposes the hard truth and speaks to power and the realities of what has and has not changed over time in the U.S. I highly recommend the book.
18 people found this helpful
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Brilliant, profound and witty

I tore through Tressie McMillan Cottom's book in just a few hours, underlining copiously. There is so much wisdom and humor here, and her essay In The Name of Beauty is something I will return to again and again for its brilliance and boldness. Highly recommended!
- Leta Hong Fincher
10 people found this helpful
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Reminds Me of the Movie, Forrest Gump.

This book rings the Forrest Gump bell. Years ago I watched Forrest Gump & thought it stunk. Yet, everywhere I looked & listened; people were ranting & raving about it. At work I found myself in the lone Ranger camp; except for my best friend, he couldn't stand it either. So here I am again. Thick is similar in its overall praise and I'm out on the fringes of opinion. Why?
Perhaps the biggest reason is that I can't identify. I'm whit to be sure; though not at all in the upper income brackets. In fact, I'm near the bottom. I live in a heavily populated black community. So the race thing is ever present; but breached by similar economic factors. Also, I wasn't raised racist in any fashion, shape or form. I find is an exploited weakness that's been tooled to precision by the ruling class. If there's any fault I find in Thick; it's that it divides by race, not by income. That it is not brazen enough in exposing the on-going class warfare. Warfare based primarily on income. It's a flat-out economic war on the 99%'ers.
The author does touch on this many times, but do so on the periphery, addressing class with culture. writes about attitudes & tastes. Then, inevitably she moves into whiteness/blackness. Yes, she starkly, consistently beckons the reader to the harsh inbuilt realities of race prejudice expressed in many societal structures that's extremely difficult to breach. But, in mind's eye; that's a given, a no-brainer.
So, as I read page after page, essay after essay, I found the black woman I see occasionally on the busses I ride. She sometimes refuses me an empty seat that's beside her. She sometimes give's it up; but only as show. It's not given freely. There's a return market eyeballs' value attached.
Therein, Is my prejudice against the collapsing distinction between commercial and non commercial modes of experience; the neoliberalism that fashions all kinds of activities into the fabric of the marketplace.
I'm not buying. For some unquantifiable reason; I stand outside the crowded accolades of Forrest Gump cheers, wondering what I missed.
9 people found this helpful
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If you only read one collection of essays this year, read this one

I love The New Press. I have discovered so many amazing writers through them that I would most likely not have heard of otherwise. Nowadays I frequently check their upcoming releases, which is how I found out about Tressie McMillan Cottom. Thick is my introduction into Tressie McMillan Cottom’s work, and it’s an absolute must read. I feel embarrassed that I haven’t read her work before because it is brilliant, honest, and so full of truths.

Thick is a collection of essays covering topics such as education, entertainment, beauty standards, and healthcare amongst others, written from the standpoint of a black American woman, scholar, sociologist, feminist, and award-winning professor. Tressie McMillan Cottom uses fact, experience, personal thought, and an overall look of our society in general to provide thought-provoking, deep, intense, and very, very important view of topics that we cannot shy away from. I love how she writes: direct, accessible, but also full of well-researched facts and information that drive her points and intent home. And there is a lot of humor in these essays too, you will laugh out loud, but you will also shed a tear.

Tressie McMillan Cottom is also fearless in her writing, and doesn’t hesitate to go deep, and really force you to think about your own role in perpetuating prejudices and white supremacy. So much of this book resonated very strongly with me, I found myself nodding my head and saying “THIS” so many times through-out. So much of the content also made me realize how much I do not know, and would not know about if I didn’t actively seek out information on. Tressie McMillan Cottom brings up many challenging topics that are important to digest and talk about. And very, very hard to talk about too. Sexual assault, rape, and abuse, beauty standards created in the image of the white woman and perpetuated by us all, infant mortality, and continuous assumption that black women will always do all the work while others reap the benefits.

This review will never be able to do Thick the justice it deserves. All I can say is read it please. If you only read one collection of essays this year, read this one. Especially now.
7 people found this helpful
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Electric, thought provoking essays

I received a free e-copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review- all opinions are my own. The first thing I can say about this is that partway through reading I went online and purchased a hard copy of this book for my shelf. This is a collection of essays that start from Tressie McMillan Cottom’s specific experiences as a black female individual navigating the systemic and impossible constraints put on black women in our country, and also zooms way out to talk about these socio-political issues at large. I found the essays to be accesible and also that they brought new complexities to issues I hadn’t considered. So glad I read this book.
6 people found this helpful
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Humor and Knowledge: A wonderful voice to spend time with.

I follow Prof. Cottom on Twitter, and she's just a great voice. She does the hard task of mixing knowledge with humor and intimacy that I wanted another essay on anything. Like Roxane Gay, or David Sedaris, Prof. Cottom mixes hard facts with a lot of compassion and a wicked sense of humor when reality has you in sobs. I read the book on a Saturday and it still sits with me. I wished this had come out at Christmas. Would've been good for some of my non-booky relatives as gifts!
5 people found this helpful
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Provocative? For sure, but provoking som resistance as well as much agreement from me

In _Thick_, Tessie McMillan Cotton is so insistent about laying out her positionality — black, rural Southern-born and -bred, straight, thick-bodied, a woman with a much-published (mostly online) Ph.D. in sociology who is employed by a university (Virginia Commonwealth), very wired — that a reviewer, at least this one, feels the necessity of laying out his own — white, Northern (way North: Minnesota) born and -bred, gay, recently thick-bodied (until cut down to youthful weight by cancer and chemotherapy, a much-published (in refereed journals) man with a Ph.D. in sociology (and a post-doc in anthropology) who has never held an academic job nor Twitter or Linked-In accounts.

I am tempted to label Cotton an “injustice collector,” though mindful that there is a whole lot of injustice for her to collect, some of it, such as the early sexualized conception of black girls, she describes as being endemic in black communities (Girl, interrupted), so that white racism is not her only target.

She seems to bear particular resentment that African-born “African Americans” seem to have it easier in finding acceptance in US academia than "blacks" (a label she uses only for the US-born). She often marshals data, but does not provide any on the class origins of the African-born in US colleges and universities. Certainly, some of them come from the elites whose ancestors were the sellers of African slaves rather than being them. The princely background of Anthony Appiah leaps to mind. But most of those whom I have personally encountered are not scions of African elites, just people who did well in African schools.

I can’t help pointing out that in contrast with Cotton’s author photo (in which her skin looks café-au-lait to me), African-born students who come to the US are much blacker in hue, so that her complaints about discrimination from American-born blacks on the basis of being especially dark-skinned seem dubious to me.

Though I am by no means a fan of David Brooks (whom I encounter more often on PBS than in his writing for the New York Times, though I am an online NYT subscriber), I think he often writes about more serious matters than the column she chooses to bash and bash and bash some more in “Girl 6,” (which I think should have been titled “Women, 6”), detracting from her very solid point that there were no black women in the paid punditocracy (there is now one black one and no other women of color ones; Cotton is a HuffPost columnist, though I don’t know what salary may be attached to that).

And somewhere in her prolonged analysis of a turn of the electorate from electing Barack Trump to electing Donald Trump (Know your whites, Black is over), shouldn’t there be at least passing mention than Hillary Clinton received nearly three million more votes than Trump, so that the electorate (even with intensified voter suppression in Republican-controlled states) did not so dramatically turn (and most certainly on the Pacific Coast, where I live)?

Of the personal content in her always personal (if often bolstered by data in footnoted sources) essays, the one I find most convincing and chilling is the one on official estimations of competence (which is harder to establish for a thick-bodied black woman than for other kinds of minority citizens) and a late-pregnancy horror story. There is also some humor, periodic efforts not to be unfair, and outright (old-fashioned?) charm spread across these essays.

(I wish Cotton had included her very valuable analysis “Academic Outrage: When The Culture Wars Go Digital” in the book, btw. That would have tipped my ambivalence.)
4 people found this helpful
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required reading for everyone

This book, and its attention to the injustices faced by black girls and black women in contemporary American society, deeply resonated with me in many ways, so much so that it immediately became my favorite book. While it addresses the specifics of American racism and sexism within the context of its current political and social moment, it is difficult for me to imagine a person in any time or place who would not benefit from Professor McMillan Cottom's incisive analysis of the corrosive effect that social hierarchies have on a society. Very highly recommended.
3 people found this helpful
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Crucial Reading

These essays are crucial to any understanding of modern feminism and the various establishment forces that politely agitate against it or try to co-opt it. That makes the collection sound like medicine, especially to anyone who might be discomfited by what the author has to say. But it isn't. The essays are written clearly and engagingly. Someone who likes good writing might read for technique alone: you don't have to agree to want to read these essays.

In fact, if you don't agree, or think you don't, you might especially want to read. If you think of yourself as an ally to any marginalized people, you definitely want to read. If you belong to a marginalized group, well, I'm not going to presume to tell you what to read. But this is the best-written, most provocative collection of essays I've read in a very long time.
2 people found this helpful
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MUST READ

An excellent collection of essays from one of the most exciting social thinkers in academia (and beyond). Deep, witty, incisive, grieving and yes, fun, analyses. Tressie McMillan Cottom really gets it.
2 people found this helpful

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