My vanishing country : a memoir

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Title:

My vanishing country : a memoir

Author:

Sellers, Bakari, 1984- author.

ISBN:

9780062917454

9780062917461

Edition:

1st ed.

Physical Description:

226 pages ; 24 cm.

Contents:

Black, country, and proud -- The wounds have not healed: "don't be a dead hero" -- Black and forgotten -- School daze: the making of a Morehouse man -- The making of a politician, part 1 -- The making of a politician, part 2 -- Dreaming with my eyes open: becoming a leader -- Risk taking -- Anxiety: a black man's superpower -- A voice for the voiceless -- Why are the strongest women in the world dying? -- Why 2016 happened and the power of rhetoric.

Personal Subject:

Sellers, Bakari, 1984-

Corporate Subject:

South Carolina. General Assembly. House of Representatives -- Biography.

Subject Term:

African American legislators -- South Carolina -- Biography.

Legislators -- South Carolina -- Biography.

Rural conditions -- South Carolina -- Social conditions -- 20th century.

Racism -- South Carolina -- History -- 21st century.

Geographic Term:

Denmark (S.C.) -- Biography.

Genre:

Autobiographies

Summary:

An eye-opening odyssey through the South's past, present, and future that is a moving and gripping tribute to America's forgotten rural working-class black folks. The small town of Denmark was once a thriving hub of South Carolina's idyllic Low Country. Yet today, this majority African-American town with a population of 3,500 is emblematic of the "Forgotten South" -- small communities of color stretching from Appalachia to the Sunbelt. For CNN political analyst Bakari Sellers, Denmark is "home" -- the land on which his forefathers toiled to build lives of meaning and substance, despite systemic racism and Jim Crow laws. In My Vanishing Country, he illuminates the pride and pain that continue to fertilize the soil of one of the poorest states in the nation and the forces threatening rural working-class black life. As he eloquently and powerfully argues, places like Denmark are worth saving; its people -- and their hopes and dreams -- matter because they are an indelible part of America. Since the 2016 election, politicians and the media have focused on the struggles of the white working class while consistently overlooking the residents of Denmark. In this atmospheric, rich, and poetic book, Sellers shines a light on life in today's rural South, where Americans still struggle for the basics of modern life: internet access, groceries, medical care, and clean water. Part memoir, part historical and cultural analysis, My Vanishing Country is a compelling read that captures the remarkable spirit and resilience of one small town and makes visible other "forgotten" communities. My Vanishing Country charts Seller's extraordinary journey -- from growing up the son of civil rights icon Cleveland Sellers to building on his father's achievements as the youngest person to serve in the South Carolina legislature, to his work today at CNN, and to his life as the father of twins he hopes will embrace the Sellers family name and carry on its legacy. --

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Library	Call Number	Status
Searching... Oakdale Library	921 SELLERS	Searching... Unknown
Searching... R.H. Stafford Library (Woodbury)	921 SELLERS	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

New York Times Bestseller

What J. D. Vance did for Appalachia with Hillbilly Elegy, CNN analyst and one of the youngest state representatives in South Carolina history Bakari Sellers does for the rural South, in this important book that illuminates the lives of America's forgotten black working-class men and women.

Part memoir, part historical and cultural analysis, My Vanishing Country is an eye-opening journey through the South's past, present, and future.

Anchored in in Bakari Seller's hometown of Denmark, South Carolina, Country illuminates the pride and pain that continues to fertilize the soil of one of the poorest states in the nation. He traces his father's rise to become, friend of Stokely Carmichael and Martin Luther King, a civil rights hero, and member of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) , to explore the plight of the South's dwindling rural, black working class--many of whom can trace their ancestry back for seven generations.

In his poetic personal history, we are awakened to the crisis affecting the other "Forgotten Men & Women," who the media seldom acknowledges. For Sellers, these are his family members, neighbors, and friends. He humanizes the struggles that shape their lives: to gain access to healthcare as rural hospitals disappear; to make ends meet as the factories they have relied on shut down and move overseas; to hold on to precious traditions as their towns erode; to forge a path forward without succumbing to despair.

My Vanishing Country is also a love letter to fatherhood--to Sellers' father, his lodestar, whose life lessons have shaped him, and to his newborn twins, who he hopes will embrace the Sellers family name and honor its legacy.

Reviews (2)

Kirkus Review

An African American attorney and politician reflects on the forces that shaped him. In a candid and affecting memoir, CNN political analyst Sellers, the youngest member of the South Carolina Legislature when he was elected in 2006, chronicles his evolution as a political activist. Sellers grew up in the rural town of Denmark, South Carolina, where his family moved in 1990. Sellers loved being "country," where he could ride his bike on back roads, fish in the ponds, and play in cotton fields. Even in what he describes as a bucolic setting, the civil rights movement pervaded the family's life: Both parents were activists; Sellers was "the campaign baby" during Jesse Jackson's second run for president in 1988; and when the phone rang, the caller might well be "Uncle" Julian Bond or "Aunt" Kathleen Cleaver. The author counts as decisive his education at historically black Morehouse College, where he was "bit by the political bug," winning his first campaign to become junior class president. Later, he mounted a successful run for election to the state legislature and, in 2014, resigned that seat to run for lieutenant governor. Although his Republican opponent won that race, Sellers garnered a respectable 41% of the vote. "I always tell people that we chipped away at the glass," he writes. Sellers admits disappointment with the black church for becoming "passive and insular at best at a time when it needs to be younger and more progressive." He is forthright, as well, about suffering from anxiety, which he attributes to the fear, rage, and anger that result from continued racial oppression. Hostilities, such as the hatred that led to the Mother Emanuel AME church tragedy in Charleston, are endemic. Donald Trump's election, Sellers asserts, was caused not by economic but cultural fear "that somehow, black and brown people were going to replace whites." A strong voice for social justice emerges in an engaging memoir. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Booklist Review

Sellers' first book is a memoir of his young life in the spotlight, interwoven with cultural and political commentary. In 2006, Sellers, an African American, was famously elected to the South Carolina legislature at age 22, beating a white, 26-year incumbent. His political life focused on underserved, and therefore vanishing, communities like his hometown of Denmark, South Carolina, a predominantly Black, rural town. Denmark has no hospital. After the birth of their twins, Sellers' wife needed emergency surgery. If they had been in Denmark, Sellers is clear that he would have lost his wife. Sellers reckons with the hardest of topics: the legacy of the 1968 Orangeburg Massacre, the contested removal of the Confederate flag from the South Carolina State House after the murder of nine members of the Mother Emanuel congregation, the election of Donald Trump, and the anger and anxiety many African Americans live with. To his credit, Sellers exposes his own flaws in this book; mistakes he's not proud of. This solidly written memoir is an important addition to contemporary politics shelves.

Introduction: Black, Country, and Proud	p. 1
I The Wounds Have Not Healed: "Don't Be a Dead Hero"	p. 19
II Black and Forgotten	p. 41
III School Daze: The Making of a Morehouse Man	p. 65
IV The Making of a Politician, Part 1	p. 81
V The Making of a Politician, Part 2	p. 95
VI Dreaming with My Eyes Open: Becoming a Leader	p. 109
VII Risk Taking	p. 127
VIII Anxiety: A Black Man's Superpower	p. 151
IX A Voice for the Voiceless	p. 169
X Why Are the Strongest Women in the World Dying?	p. 189
XI Why 2016 Happened and the Power of Rhetoric	p. 205
Afterword	p. 219
Dear Donor Family	p. 223
Acknowledgments	p. 225

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