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 says Americans should treat ongoing race and class discrimination similar to the way someone inheriting a home examines its foundation. 

You’re not the one who built the foundation or set the uneven pillars, but, as soon as you own the house, whatever happens from that point forward is your responsibility. 

“You may not want to go into the basement after it rains. You know, you don’t want to go and think about what has happened and what’s going on down there,” Wilkerson told host Kerri Miller during a Talking Volumes conversation last fall. “But if you don’t go into that basement, it’s at your own peril. You’re only hurting yourself.”

Wilkerson said the same is true of America and noted that there isn’t anyone alive today who was here when the first colonists arrived or when slavery was first implemented. However, we must face that history head on. 

Wilkerson’s most recent book, “Caste: The Origins of our Discontents,” describes the nation’s structural inequities in greater detail and offers readers a better understanding of how they are still at work today.

To listen to the full conversation you can use the audio player above.

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We revisited a virtual Talking Volumes discussion with Wilkerson about her most recent book “Caste: The Origins of our Discontents.”

Rebroadcast: A Talking Volumes conversation with Isabel Wilkerson

Screenshot of two women speaking over video call.

Rebroadcast: A Talking Volumes conversation with Isabel Wilkerson

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