Northampton author hopes book will help spur ‘fight for justice’

NORTHAMPTON — As a child, author and educator Tiffany Jewell says that she recognized racism around her, but lacked the tools and language to describe what she had seen and take action.

Now, Jewell wants to give children — and adults — the resources to recognize and combat racism with her newly launched title, “This Book is Anti-Racist: 20 Lessons on how to Wake Up, Take Action, and Do the Work.”

At a launch event held Sunday afternoon at Booklink Booksellers in Thornes Marketplace, Jewell told a standing-room-only audience that she wrote the book because she wanted to give her readers “a tool to grow into people who are going to fight for justice.”

The launch was held as a conversation with EmbraceRace co-founder Melissa Giraud, whose Amherst-based organization supports racial and anti-bias education for children. A poetry reading and question-and-answer session followed this conversation, and Jewell signed copies of the book at the end of the event.

Racism is a subject that goes under-addressed among children, according to Jewell, who is the director of curriculum and instruction at the Montessori School of Northampton. While some may have concerns that the topic is too distressing for young audiences, Jewell believes that children often find this education empowering.

“Often … we want to shy them away like they’re not ready for this,” Jewell said. “But they are ready for this.”

The book does not avoid terms that may be new to readers, such as “ancestral trauma,” “chattel slavery” and “neurodiverse” — instead providing definitions for these terms in a glossary — and cites information from sources that range from international media outlets to University of California, Los Angeles studies.

In addition to educational material, the book also asks readers to keep their own reflective journals, which Jewell said encourages active engagement with the material.

With appropriate education, Jewell wants children to gain “an understanding of the world and how it works, and that they have the power to undo what has been done.”

Although Jewell wrote the book primarily for children, she said they are not the only readers who can benefit from the lessons included.

“Just because it’s written for kids doesn’t mean adults can’t get anything out of it,” Jewell said.

“Children’s books, they get right to the point,” she added, “because we need that.”

Children and adults were among the audience members, including Farah Ameen, who attended the event with her daughter, Somia Ameen-McCabe. The pair attended the event to support EmbraceRace, which Ameen said she is “really involved with.” While waiting in line to get her copy, Ameen added she likes that the book is also a workbook.

Ameen said that her household talks about race “all the time,” but she sees these conversations as necessities: “It’s important to keep talking,” she said.