Why Black People Die Sooner, 9780231217965
Hardcover
Racism, not race, shortens Black lives. Time for change.
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Why Black People Die Sooner

what medicine gets wrong about race and how to fix it

$44.00

  • Hardcover

    280 pages

  • Release Date

    11 November 2025

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Summary

Unmasking Racial Bias: How Racism Shortens Black Lives

There is a persistent gap in life expectancy between Black people and their white counterparts in the United States. It is a direct result of structural racism within American society and has nothing to do with genetic differences. In past eras, scientific racism sought to shift the blame to the supposed physical inferiority of people of African descent. Even today, medicine labors under false beliefs derived from nineteenth-cen…

Book Details

ISBN-13:9780231217965
ISBN-10:023121796X
Author:Joseph L. Graves
Publisher:Columbia University Press
Imprint:Columbia University Press
Format:Hardcover
Number of Pages:280
Release Date:11 November 2025
Weight:0g
Dimensions:235mm x 156mm
What They're Saying

Critics Review

Why Black People Die Sooner examines how race and racism remain entrenched in medical thought, policy, technology, and practice, despite a half-century of biological research that refutes a genetic basis of race. Graves explains how evolutionary biology, history, and health science converge to challenge pervasive medical misconceptions and proposes solutions grounded in evolutionary biology and precision medicine. – Paula Ivey Henry, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public HealthThis groundbreaking book exposes how racism systematically undermines medical diagnosis and treatment, while challenging political policies that perpetuate health inequities rooted in socioeconomic disparities. Its rigorous documentation and compelling analysis make it an essential resource for evolutionary medicine courses and will resonate with anyone seeking to understand the intersection of race, politics, and public health. – Stephen Stearns, Edward P. Bass Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Yale UniversityWhy Black People Die Sooner is another tour de force from Joseph L. Graves. He shines a bright light on the persistently devastating inequalities in health among races and offers solutions for society and health care. A brilliant synthesis and a must read. – Alan Goodman, former president of the American Anthropological Association

About The Author

Joseph L. Graves

Joseph L. Graves Jr. is the MacKenzie Scott Endowed Professor of Biology at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. A fellow of the Council of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, he received the Liberty Science Center’s Genius Award in 2024. His books include Racism, Not Race: Answers to Frequently Asked Questions (Columbia, 2021, with Alan H. Goodman), which received the 2024 W. W. Howells Prize for the best book in biological anthropology.

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