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    Surviving the White Gaze: A Memoir
    Surviving the White Gaze: A Memoir
    Surviving the White Gaze: A Memoir
    Audiobook7 hours

    Surviving the White Gaze: A Memoir

    Written by Rebecca Carroll

    Narrated by Rebecca Carroll

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    An Esquire Best Book of 2021

    A “gorgeous and powerful” (The New York Times Book Review) memoir from cultural critic Rebecca Carroll recounting her painful struggle to overcome a completely white childhood to forge her identity as a Black woman in America.

    Rebecca Carroll grew up the only Black person in her rural New Hampshire town. Adopted at birth by artistic parents who believed in peace, love, and zero population growth, her early childhood was loving and idyllic—and yet she couldn’t articulate the deep sense of isolation she increasingly felt as she grew older.

    Everything changed when she met her birth mother, a young white woman, who consistently undermined Carroll’s sense of her Blackness and self-esteem. Carroll’s childhood became harrowing, and her memoir explores the tension between the aching desire for her birth mother’s acceptance, the loyalty she feels toward her adoptive parents, and the search for her racial identity. As an adult, Carroll forged a path from city to city, struggling along the way with difficult boyfriends, depression, eating disorders, and excessive drinking. Ultimately, through the support of her chosen Black family, she was able to heal.

    “Generous, intimate, searching, and formidable” (The Boston Globe), Surviving the White Gaze is a timely examination of racism and racial identity in America today.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster Audio
    Release dateFeb 2, 2021
    ISBN9781797119380
    Author

    Rebecca Carroll

    Rebecca Carroll is a writer, cultural critic, and host of the podcasts Come Through with Rebecca Carroll (WNYC Studios), and Billie Was a Black Woman. Her writing has been published in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Essence, New York magazine, and The Guardian, where she was a regular columnist for two years. A former cultural critic for WNYC, and critic-at-large for the Los Angeles Times, she is an editor-at-large for The Meteor media collective, as well as the author of several interview-based books about race in America, including the award-winning Sugar in the Raw: Voices of Young Black Girls in America. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and son.

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    Reviews for Surviving the White Gaze

    4.5/5

    55 ratings6 reviews

    What our readers think

    Readers find this title to be incredibly powerful and important. The writing is beautiful and the author's story is riveting and moving. It resonates with the experiences of Black TRAs and helps readers understand the privilege they may not be aware of. Although there may be some incomplete versions, it is worth completing. Overall, this book is enlightening and a must-read for anyone looking to improve society."

    What did you think?

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    • 5/5
      Some of the most beautiful writing I've ever had the pleasure of reading. Absolute perfection - start to finish.
    • 5/5
      as a Black TRA this book resonated with many of my experiences. A must read
    • 5/5
      Everything was so familiar, guess I'm not crazy after all.
    • 5/5
      This was an incredibly powerful book. I'm so glad that Rebecca Carroll told her story. I think it's an important book for anyone to read, whether you can personally relate to her story as a survivor of the white gaze, or if you are a part of that white gaze. I happen to be the latter... and I found her story riveting and moving. We need to see people as they are and listen to their stories and their voices, if we ever want to improve our society.
    • 5/5
      Though I love this book thus far, this version (as of May 2021) is incomplete. Definitely worth completing, but you may have to do so on Audible.com.
    • 4/5
      This book was very enlightening. It helped me to understand truly, how much I don’t know about this subject. We as whites live so privileged, and without even realizing i believe, think we are deserving.
      Thank you Rebecca.