Word Up welcomes Michael Staudenmaier to discuss his new book White, Black, Brown: Becoming Puerto Rican in Chicago (Latinx Histories), a portrait of the Puerto Rican community’s experience of racialization in Chicago. Joining Staudenmaier will be Johanna Fernandez, author of The Young Lords: A Radical History.

Drawing on an extraordinary array of archival material, much of it previously inaccessible, Michael Staudenmaier highlights cultural and political projects profoundly informed by nationalist sentiments, from beauty pageants and parades to protests and bombings to elections and legal battles. Revealing how nationalism became a key site of racial formation for Puerto Ricans in Chicago, White, Black, Brown shows how they understood themselves and demanded to be seen by their neighbors and the world.