Saratoga Book Festival, Saratoga Springs Public Library, and Skidmore College are pleased to present this SaratogaREADS! event featuring Dr. Andre M. Perry, Senior Fellow in the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution, and author of Know Your Price: Valuing Black Lives and Property in America’s Black Cities, in conversation with Dr. Amon Emeka, Associate Professor of Sociology and Director of the First Year Experience at Skidmore College.
Dr. Andre Perry’s research focuses on race and structural inequality, education, and economic inclusion. Since 2013, Perry’s column on educational equity has appeared in the Hechinger Report, a nonprofit news organization focused on producing in-depth education journalism. Perry also contributes to TheRoot.com and the Washington Post. Perry’s views, opinions and educational leadership have been featured on CNN, PBS, National Public Radio, The New Republic and NBC.
In Know Your Price: Valuing Black Lives and Property in America’s Black Cities he takes readers on a tour of six Black-majority cities whose assets and strengths are undervalued, beginning in his hometown of Wilkinsburg, a small city east of Pittsburgh and spotlighting five others where he has deep connections: Detroit, Birmingham, New Orleans, Atlanta, and Washington, D.C. He provides an intimate look at the assets that should be of greater value to residents—and that can be if they demand it.
Dr. Emeka uses statistical methods, big data and sociological theories to teach and research patterns of racial identity, racial exclusion and immigrant adaptation in contemporary U.S. society. His research has been published in influential scholarly journals and referenced in popular media outlets including the New York Times.