Review of Patrisse Khan-Cullors and asha bandele’s When They Call You a Terrorist: The Power of Black Communities and Righteous Anger

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In When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir (2017), Patrisse Khan-Cullors recounts events from her personal life that spurred her to activism on behalf of Black communities. It was through this turn to political activism that Cullors became allied with her coauthor asha bandele. While social ills like mass incarceration, racial profiling, and redlining may be abstract concepts to many Americans, Cullors’ and bandele’s lives have been fraught with fallout from these and other anti-Black policies. In this memoir, Cullors traces a path from the everyday injustices she has endured to her activism as a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) Movement. Though the work focuses on Cullors’ experiences, her story is hardly unique. However, by interweaving the story of BLM with her own, Cullors demystifies the connection between anti-Black policies and their effects on ordinary Black Americans. The inclusion of personal experiences of loss, anguish, injustice, and righteous anger imbue Cullors’ activism with a sense of propriety and even inevitability. This thoughtful framing of her life and work (as well as those of her co-author) combats the stereotype of the needlessly angry Black woman and insinuates that Americans who are not outraged are not paying enough attention.

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