Jonathan Metzl - "Dying of Whiteness" - Chauncey DeVega

Monday, April 1, 2019 - 6:00pm - 7:00pm
Event Presenter/Author: 
Jonathan Metzl

Jonathan Metzl discusses Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America's Heartland

At 57th Street Books

RSVP HERE (Please note that your RSVP is requested but not required)


About the book: In the era of Donald Trump, many lower- and middle-class white Americans are drawn to politicians who pledge to make their lives great again. But as Dying of Whiteness shows, the policies that result actually place white Americans at ever-greater risk of sickness and death.

Physician Jonathan M. Metzl's quest to understand the health implications of "backlash governance" leads him across America's heartland. Interviewing a range of everyday Americans, he examines how racial resentment has fueled progun laws in Missouri, resistance to the Affordable Care Act in Tennessee, and cuts to schools and social services in Kansas. And he shows these policies' costs: increasing deaths by gun suicide, falling life expectancies, and rising dropout rates. White Americans, Metzl argues, must reject the racial hierarchies that promise to aid them but in fact lead our nation to demise.

About the author: Jonathan M. Metzl is the Frederick B. Rentschler II professor of sociology and psychiatry at Vanderbilt University and director of its Center for Medicine, Health, and Society. He is the author of several books and a prominent expert on gun violence and mental illness. He hails from Kansas City, Missouri, and lives in Nashville, Tennessee.

About the interlocutor: Chauncey DeVega is a staff writer for Salon where he focuses on politics and culture. He is also the host of the weekly podcast The Chauncey DeVega Show.

Event Location: 
57th Street Books
1301 E 57th St.
Chicago, IL 60637