Radio Smart Talk: Representing the Race author Kenneth W. Mack

Radio Smart Talk for Wednesday, January 23:

The word representative comes up often in Kenneth W. Mack’s book, Representing the Race — The Creation of the Civil Rights Lawyer. Mack writes that in the 19th and 20th centuries, black men and women who aspired to practice law almost always faced unique challenges, not including widespread discrimination and rejection. For example, whether blacks in that time period could join the bar or even vote often depended on whether they could pass as white.

African-American lawyers were expected to represent their race by standing apart from their racial community but at the same time, they had to be authentic and sympathetic to blacks.

Representing the Race — The Creation of the Civil Rights Lawyer tells the stories of several black attorneys throughout history, including the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, who worked in a legal system dominated by whites, but found ways to make their own significant mark.

The author of the book — Kenneth W. Mack — is a native of Harrisburg and teaches at Harvard Law School. He will profile the lawyers he writes about on Wednesday’s Radio Smart Talk.

Representing the Race is witf‘s and Midtown Scholar Bookstore’s Pick-of-the-Month for January.

Listen to the program: {mp3remote}http://witf.vo.llnwd.net/o35/smarttalk/radiosmarttalk/RST_January232013.mp3{/mp3remote}