Using interviews with leaders and participants, as well as historical archives, the author documents three interracial sites where white Americans put themselves into unprecedented relationships with African Americans, Mexican Americans, and Asian Americans. In teen summer camps in the New York City and Los Angeles areas, students from largely segregated schools worked and played together; in Washington, DC, families fought blockbusting and white flight to build an integrated neighborhood; and in San Antonio, white community activists joined in coalition with Mexican American groups to advocate for power in a city government monopolized by Anglos. Women often took the lead in organizations that were upsetting patterns of men's protective authority at the same time as white people's racial dominance.
Phyllis Palmer, Professor of American Studies and Women's Studies at George Washington University, is the author of Domesticity and Dirt: Housewives and Domestic Servants in the United States, 1920-1940.
"Impeccably researched and invitingly written, Living as Equals is an inspiring brief for how crucial the work of the heart is to long-lasting and meaningful social change." --Avery F. Gordon, University of California, Santa Barbara
"In telling the story of three experiments in interracial cooperation during the period of the civil rights movement, Phyllis Palmer uncovers a hopeful response by white citizens to the challenge to American systems of racial repression." --Tracy K'Meyer, University of Louisville, author of Interracialism and Christian Community in the Postwar South: The Story of Koinonia Farm
"...leaves readers hopeful about the possibilities of successful racial bridge building for pluralistic communities in the twenty-first century." --Journal of American Ethnic History
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