June 20-21, 2015: Crowd-sourced Responses to the Charleston Terrorist Attack

[I’ve said it before and will say it again: one of the only positives to come out of all the American horrors of the last few years has been the volume of amazing public scholarly writing produced in response to them. That’s never been more evident than this week, in the aftermath of the terrorist shooting at Charleston’s historicMother Emanuel AME church. Here, then, a handful of the many such important pieces. Please add more, and your own thoughts, in comments!]

Raw Story on the historic anniversary that almost certainly prompted this act of racial terrorism.

Benjamin Park on the history of black churches in America.

Charles Pierce on what we can and should think and speak out.

Heather Cox Richardson on the history and presence of domestic terrorism.

And Ta-Nehisi Coates on the Confederate flag still flying over the South Carolina capitol.

Next series starts Monday,

Ben

PS. Other Charleston thoughts or links you’d share?

PPS. Two more great pieces posted after I scheduled this post: Rob Greene on the church's history; and Josh Marshall of TPM on the dark history of race and terror.