Seeing a Color-Blind Future The Paradox of Race

In these five eloquent and passionate pieces (which she gave as the prestigious Reith Lectures for the BBC) Patricia J. Williams asks how we might achieve a world where "color doesn't matter"--where whiteness is not equated with normalcy and blackness with exoticism and danger. Drawing on her own experience, Williams delineates the great divide between "the poles of other people's imagination and the nice calm center of oneself where dignity resides," and discusses how it might be bridged as a first step toward resolving racism. Williams offers us a new starting point--"a sensible and sustained consideration"--from which we might begin to deal honestly with the legacy and current realities of our prejudices.

Patricia J. Williams is a columnist ("Diary of a Mad Lawyer," The Nation), and a professor of law at Columbia University. Her previous books are The Rooster's Egg and The Alchemy of Race and Rights. She also contributes regularly to Ms. and The Village Voice.