So I read this on recommendation from my wife. Here's the true story: Griffin, a white journalist that is working for civil rights, discovers a way to make himself look black for short periods of time. He does this and then travels around the country. This book is a record of his experience, and how the world changed to him when he took on a skin of blackness. It seems a pretty groundbreaking book, though it has become a bit dated, much would probably remain relevant today. ( )

The premise of Black Like Me is provocative even today: a white journalist medically darkens his skin and travels to the American South to experience what it's like living as a black American there. But this wasn't done in today's world; it was done in 1959, when racial tensions were running very high and some white people were of the view that blacks weren't just foreign, but actually subhuman and animal-like.

Griffin actually received death threats after he came out on television with his experiences. His family and his parents both required protection from angry citizens, and his parents ended up moving out of the country to escape the persecution. What is *wrong* with people, that they would attack a journalist for a report such as this: "I have looked diligently for all aspects of 'inferiority' among them and I cannot find them." Or "When all the talk, all the propaganda has been cut away, the criterion is nothing but the color of skin."

Dignity and equality among humankind are neither a threat nor an injustice to anybody, and Griffin's work becomes a catalyst for confronting the baseless cruelty for racial prejudice. An important and emotional book ( )

This is a startling, disturbing and unforgettable book. The closest you can come to walking in another's shoes. Griffin, a white man, darkens his skin and disguises himself to experience life as a black man in the deep South in the late 1950's.His experiences are not just eye opening, but deeply changing. Every American should read this to understand just an inkling of the race dilemma. John Griffin's later interviews and articles about his experiences are interesting as well. ( )

This is the story of a man who changed his skin. In the late 1950's John Griffin, a white journalist, stained his skin dark brown and traveled into the deep south to experience racism firsthand. He was shocked at what he found. Being educated and well-spoken did not help him find employment or be treated with courtesy from white people. On the contrary, he was often treated despicably by them, and many white men defended to him with complete candor and confidence their racist attitudes. He encountered prejudice, anger, fear and mistrust- on the part of both black and white people, towards each other. He was also recipient of compassion and acts of kindness from his fellow men... and returned to his own home months later a changed man. Black Like Me is a very moving account, one that still makes an impression on me just as it did when I first read it back in high school (not as an assignment).

from the DogEar Diary ( )

What a heart-wrenching book! It gave me a much deeper understanding of the times of the civil rights movement, and even of the racism against blacks today.