Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America

Overview

Notes From Your Bookseller
Sixteen faceted essays thematically connected, asking the question—who belongs? Who is an American citizen? Who is "not quite"? The question is personal and political and Lalami explores the many circumstances that render this belonging conditional status. An elegantly written, poignant meditation on the effects of exclusion and suspicion and what embracing citizenship might mean.

A New York Times Editors' Choice • Finalist for the California Book Award • Longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction • Best Book of the Year: Time, NPR, Bookpage, Los Angeles Times

In this brilliantly argued and deeply personal work, Pulitzer Prize finalist Laila Lalami recounts her unlikely journey from Moroccan immigrant to U.S.citizen, using her own story as a starting point for an exploration of the rights, liberties, and protections that are traditionally associated with American citizenship. Tapping into history, politics, and literature, she elucidates how accidents of birth—such as national origin, race, and gender—that once determined the boundaries of Americanness still cast their shadows today, poignantly illustrating how white supremacy survives through adaptation and legislation. Weaving together her experiences with an examination of the place of nonwhites in the broader American culture, Lalami illuminates how conditional citizens are all those whom America embraces with one arm and pushes away with the other.

The book, Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America [Bulk, Wholesale, Quantity] ISBN# 9780525436041 in Paperback by Laila Lalami may be ordered in bulk quantities. Minimum starts at 25 copies. Availability based on publisher status and quantity being ordered.