Toxic Communities: Environmental Racism, Industrial Pollution, and Residential Mobility

In Toxic Communities, Dorceta E. Taylor presents an argument that people of color have been the victims of environmental racism for many decades, but mostly focuses on the struggles of the Black community in the US. She does this through the description of various incidents and studies performed in a number of communities across the country in a scholarly, informational tone, rather than a narrative tone. Each case is presented in its own small section of a chapter under a heading that lists the name of the region or town, and the company involved, though there is a chapter that focuses on zoning that breaks from that format slightly. Each example is also presented along with accompanying facts and statistics, and excepting the zoning chapter, most of the book is presented in this format. Taylor’s sources are almost exclusively scholarly studies on Environmental Justice cases, or the EJ cases themselves. She tends to list them in order of occurrence in reference to an incident in a certain area, with an in-text citation. The reference section of the book is extensive and includes the full citations for each.The writing style can be a bit awkward to read straight through, since it is split into many sections within each chapter, and each section is all purely factual information and statistics pertaining to the region it is referring to. One of these statistics that Taylor discusses pertains to the rise in black populations. She writes, “the most dramatic rise in the Black population occurred in Memphis, where the percentage of Blacks increased from 17.2% in 1860 to 40% in 1910.” (Dorceta E. Taylor 2014, pg 153) I had somewhat expected the book to be more of a narrative, as well as to have the references spread out across many minorities, however Taylor focuses mostly on the black community and what they have suffered through many EJ cases. I am very glad, however, that Taylor covered Birmingham’s zoning laws in detail, because while the writing can be dry at times in Toxic Communities, it still covers subjects that are interesting to me for historical study, since I am focused on People of Color, as one myself. On the other hand I don’t know if I have anyone that I talk to regularly who would be interested in the subjects in the book, and so I don’t personally have anyone to recommend it to.

I purchased it for a class and love this book. Plan on re reading it. Kids should be taught this book at school. More people need to read it.

Orderd for school. Came fast and as described

nice one

very good book

I ordered a new copy; however, the book I received was badly disfigured.

Just a described.

Excellent read