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This Will Be My Undoing
- Living at the Intersection of Black, Female, and Feminist in (White) America
- Narrated by: Morgan Jerkins
- Length: 7 hrs and 5 mins
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Summary
From one of the fiercest critics writing today, Morgan Jerkins' highly anticipated collection of linked essays interweaves her incisive commentary on pop culture, feminism, Black history, misogyny, and racism with her own experiences to confront the very real challenges of being a Black woman today - perfect for fans of Roxane Gay's Bad Feminist, Rebecca Solnit's Men Explain Things to Me, and Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie's We Should All Be Feminists.
Morgan Jerkins is only in her 20s, but she has already established herself as an insightful, brutally honest writer who isn't afraid of tackling tough, controversial subjects. In This Will Be My Undoing, she takes on perhaps one of the most provocative contemporary topics: What does it mean to "be" - to live as, to exist as - a Black woman today? This is a book about Black women, but it's necessary listening for all Americans.
Doubly disenfranchised by race and gender, often deprived of a place within the mostly White mainstream feminist movement, Black women are objectified, silenced, and marginalized, with devastating consequences, in ways both obvious and subtle that are rarely acknowledged in our country's larger discussion about inequality. In This Will Be My Undoing, Jerkins becomes both narrator and subject to expose the social, cultural, and historical story of Black female oppression that influences the Black community as well as the White, male-dominated world at large.
Whether she's writing about Sailor Moon; Rachel Dolezal; the stigma of therapy; her complex relationship with her own physical body; the pain of dating when men say they don't "see color"; being a Black visitor in Russia; the specter of "the fast-tailed girl" and the paradox of Black female sexuality; or disabled Black women in the context of the "Black Girl Magic" movement, Jerkins is compelling and revelatory.
Critic reviews
"This raw, compelling memoir makes for an outstanding audiobook, and the author's narration is well done. The depth of her intelligence is immediately obvious, but what's more riveting is her brutal honesty and her willingness to speak her truth--both beautiful and messy.... This book is a must-listen - both funny and heartbreaking - but more importantly, it is an eye-opening call to action." (AudioFile)
What listeners say about This Will Be My Undoing
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- eleniki
- 31-03-23
I'm not sure..
..who Morgan Jerkins wrote this book for. I started to read it with interest, but slowly realised that I was the enemy.
I felt like that girl who sees a warm welcome given to her by someone she hardly knows, and approaches with a smile, only to realise the person the wave and smile were intended for was just behind her. Kind of humiliating.
There are many things I could observe about this book, many flaws and generalisations (a major issue for me was the very fast and dull monotone the author read it in, which was not really resolved by reducing the speed to .95), but I don't think my opinion would be considered for a second in MJ's very black and American context.
I will say though, that if the chapter on black girls imitating white girls' attempts to dance like a black girl, and her gleeful drumming home of the anecdotal stories of black slaves imitating their clearly oblivious and dull-witted white masters was written in reverse, it would be considered neo-nazi in its sentiment.
The book seems to be for black women, not for anyone else. As a white European woman, I felt put down, preached at, and worst of all, painted into a corner, where any kind of action, move or word would only bring the 'blinding white' paint right up over me and down my throat.
A love letter to the usual centre-of-the-universe people like Michelle Obama and Beyoncé (yawn) and a hate letter to all of us who, it would seem, chose to be born white.
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