This highly accessible account of the evolution of American racism outlines how 'colorblind' approaches to discrimination ensured the perpetuation of racial inequality in the United States well beyond the 1960s.

• A highly accessible account of the evolution of American racism, its perpetuation, and black people's struggles for equality in the post-civil rights era
• Guides students to a better understanding of the experiences of black Americans and their ongoing struggles for justice, by highlighting the interconnectedness of African American history with that of the nation as a whole
• Highlights the economic and political functions that racism has served throughout the nation's history
• Discusses the continuation of the freedom movement beyond the 1960s to provide a comprehensive new historiography of racial equality and social justice

Greta de Jong is Associate Professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. Her research focuses on the connections between race and class and the ways that African Americans have fought for economic as well as political rights from the end of slavery through the twenty-first century. She is the author of A Different Day: African American Struggles for Justice in Rural Louisiana, 1900–1970 (2002).