"America's preeminent law firms, investment banks, and management consultant firms are known for being difficult workplaces. Between long, stressful hours on the job, low odds of promotions, often-unrewarding work assignments, and "up-or-out" personnel practices, most people who begin their careers in these institutions leave within several years of starting. But life in these firms is especially difficult for Black professionals, who leave elite firms more quickly and receive far fewer promotions than their white counterparts. As a result, they remain highly underrepresented in senior positions. Amid increasing calls for diversity in many workplaces, why are these institutions still so bad at maintaining, cultivating, and promoting Black employees? Author Kevin Woodson is a sociologist and JD, one who knows firsthand what life at an elite law firm feels like as a Black man. By examining the experiences of more than 100 Black professionals in elite corporate law firms, investment banks, and management consulting firms, Woodson offers a revelatory new assessment of workplace inequality in high-status jobs. Black professionals say their biggest obstacle in the workplace is not explicit bias. What they identify instead is "racial discomfort"-social alienation and stigma anxiety. Woodson shows how this country's larger history of segregation and discrimination influence the micro-interactions between individual workers, generating firm-level patterns of inequality, with far-reaching implications for efforts to understand and overcome racial inequality in the workplace. In calling attention to the racialized nature and impact of many seemingly innocuous and insignificant aspects of professional life, Woodson illuminates the impact of certain everyday practices and arrangements in reproducing racial hierarchy. The project helps explain the inadequacy of unconscious bias training and other current approaches to take on workplace inequities. Racial inequality in the workforce is not just a matter of racial bias. To more fully understand and address the dynamics that so consistently undermine equality and inclusiveness in elite firms and other employment contexts, we must look beyond bias, to a broader set of challenges"--

Minorities in all communities strive to keep their communities strong and support the businesses that are owned and operated in their communities. “Buying Black” has been a mantra in the Black community for years and suggests that African Americans, in particular, should concentrate their trillion dollars in buying power into the businesses owned by other African Americans in their communities for the purpose of economic empowerment. Although that is true, buying black doesn’t occur in the Black community as often as desired, and there are many contributing factors that are well known, yet ignored, and some factors that are beyond those commonly discussed. In Breaking Through the Black Ceiling, author and business owner Angela T. Jones provides insight on some of the common misconceptions and business practices that contribute to why more Black consumers spend their dollars with non Black owned businesses at a disproportionate rate. Jones also provides tips that any business owner can implement into their business that will not only help them provide better products and services, but also will help them become successful, regardless of their customer demographic. As altruistic as the concept of “buying black” may be, money is green and diversity makes dollars. Breaking Through the Black Ceiling is dedicated to the memory of Mark England, business owner and fashion designer from Detroit, Michigan. A portion of each copy sold will be donated to Karmanos Cancer Institute in Detroit, Michigan.

Politicians continually tell us that anyone can get ahead. But is that really true? This important best-selling book takes readers behind the closed doors of elite employers to reveal how class affects who gets to the top. Friedman and Laurison show that a powerful ‘class pay gap’ exists in Britain’s elite occupations. Even when those from working-class backgrounds make it into prestigious jobs, they earn, on average, 16% less than colleagues from privileged backgrounds. But why is this the case? . Drawing on 175 interviews across four case studies - television, accountancy, architecture, and acting – they explore the complex barriers facing the upwardly mobile. This is a rich, ambitious book that demands we take seriously not just the glass but also the class ceiling.

Young poet Rick Reid enters the pantheon of Chris Abani's Black Goat poetry series.

Dents in the Ceiling is a first-hand account from more than 30 African American women in Corporate America about navigating sexism and racism, forging allies, and rebounding resiliently throughout their careers.

A compelling study of a subtle and insidious form of racial inequality in American law and culture. Why does racial equality continue to elude African Americans even after the election of a black president? Liberals blame white racism while conservatives blame black behavior. Both define the race problem in socioeconomic terms, mainly citing jobs, education, and policing. Roy Brooks, a distinguished legal scholar, argues that the reality is more complex. He defines the race problem African Americans face today as a three-headed hydra involving socioeconomic, judicial, and cultural conditions. Focusing on law and culture, Brooks defines the problem largely as racial subordination—“the act of impeding racial progress in pursuit of nonracist interests.” Racial subordination is little understood and underacknowledged, yet it produces devastating and even deadly racial consequences that affect both poor and socioeconomically successful African Americans. Brooks addresses a serious problem, in many ways more dangerous than overt racism, and offers a well-reasoned solution that draws upon the strongest virtues America has exhibited to the world.

Why are Americans governed by the rich? Millionaires make up only three percent of the public but control all three branches of the federal government. How did this happen? What stops lower-income and working-class Americans from becoming politicians? The first book to answer these urgent questions, The Cash Ceiling provides a compelling and comprehensive account of why so few working-class people hold office--and what reformers can do about it. Using extensive data on candidates, politicians, party leaders, and voters, Nicholas Carnes debunks popular misconceptions (like the idea that workers are unelectable or unqualified to govern), identifies the factors that keep lower-class Americans off the ballot and out of political institutions, and evaluates a variety of reform proposals. In the United States, Carnes shows, elections have a built-in "cash ceiling," a series of structural barriers that make it almost impossible for the working-class to run for public office. Elections take a serious toll on candidates, many working-class Americans simply can't shoulder the practical burdens, and civic and political leaders often pass them over in favor of white-collar candidates. But these obstacles aren't inevitable. Pilot programs to recruit, train, and support working-class candidates have the potential to increase the economic diversity of our governing institutions and ultimately amplify the voices of ordinary citizens.

He's bad at sports and not much better at school, but Jimmy sure can draw terrific cartoons. And his dream, like that of his Uncle Lester, who writes flop Broadway musicals'is to be recognized for what he loves doing most.

Ayodele has just turned eighteen and has decided, having now reached womanhood, that the time is right to lose her virginity. She's drawn up a shortlist: Reuben, the failsafe; an, a long-admired schoolfriend; Frederick Adams, the 42-year-old, soon-to-be-pot-bellied father of her best friend. What she doesn't know is that her choice of suitor will have a drastic effect on the rest of her life. Three men. Three paths. One will send Ayodele to Europe, to university and to a very different life - but it will be a voyage strewn with heartache. Another will send her around the globe on an epic journey, transforming her beyond recognition but at the cost of an almost unbearable loss. And another will see her remain in Africa, a wife and mother caught in a polygamous marriage. Each will change her irrevocably - but which will she choose? "A fresh, vibrant first novel set in Africa and England, exploring the three different paths Adoyele's life could take" The Bookseller "The energy and verve of Forster's first few pages are breathtaking, and Ayodele is irresistible" Daily Telegraph "a ... complex examination of potential futures ... Forster has written a thought-provoking series of narratives" Financial Times "the tussle between fate and free will ... a warmly informed portrait of modern African womanhood" Observer

From the acclaimed author of Brunelleschi's Dome and Leonardo and the Last Supper, the riveting story of how Michelangelo, against all odds, created the masterpiece that has ever since adorned the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. In 1508, despite strong advice to the contrary, the powerful Pope Julius II commissioned Michelangelo Buonarroti to paint the ceiling of the newly restored Sistine Chapel in Rome. Despite having completed his masterful statue David four years earlier, he had little experience as a painter, even less working in the delicate medium of fresco, and none with challenging curved surfaces such as the Sistine ceiling's vaults. The temperamental Michelangelo was himself reluctant: He stormed away from Rome, incurring Julius's wrath, before he was eventually persuaded to begin. Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling recounts the fascinating story of the four extraordinary years he spent laboring over the twelve thousand square feet of the vast ceiling, while war and the power politics and personal rivalries that abounded in Rome swirled around him. A panorama of illustrious figures intersected during this time-the brilliant young painter Raphael, with whom Michelangelo formed a rivalry; the fiery preacher Girolamo Savonarola and the great Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus; a youthful Martin Luther, who made his only trip to Rome at this time and was disgusted by the corruption all around him. Ross King blends these figures into a magnificent tapestry of day-to-day life on the ingenious Sistine scaffolding and outside in the upheaval of early-sixteenth-century Italy, while also offering uncommon insight into the connection between art and history.