At the time I requested this book I was very interested in it. Obviously, it has been a few years since I requested this and I am no longer interested in it now. It doesn't match my current reading tastes and I apologize that I didn't read it and thank you for the kindness you showed offering it to me.

NOT QUITE NOT WHITE by Sharmila Sen contains the reflections of an immigrant who grew up in Calcutta, India and came to America when she was twelve. In commenting about that experience, Sen references her subtitle, "losing and finding race in America," saying "I will write about race as something once alien to my universe and later naturalized." Her last chapter seems especially insightful. It is there, for example, that she comments, "we do not need to call the first forty-three presidents of the United States our white presidents or our male presidents or our Christian presidents because that is exactly what all presidents are supposed to be – white, male, Christian. Only divergences need to be pointed out. A Catholic president. A Jewish President. A black president. A female president. They are a break from the norm. They require the armature of adjectives."

From her perspective, Sen further forces readers to consider the language we use, saying, "Asian was a geographic term when I lived in Asia. In the United States, I learned that Asian is a racial category." Or citing "the quintessential American phrase my children have been taught by well-meaning teachers – stranger danger." She continues to comment about school textbooks' description of the immigrant experience, asking: "should we also teach them [our children] that one day they too might be strangers in a strange land – pushed around the globe by forces of economics, politics, or nature?"

On a related note, our department is in the midst of reading Julie Lythcott-Haims' memoir titled Real American and it would be so informative to hear these authors and others who write about race in a panel together. I wonder to what extent they would see parallels or whether they would agree with a colleague of ours who asserts that your personal paradigm makes you blind to the experience of others. If it is the latter, how do we find common understanding as a country? Do reading and discussing books like this help or hinder the process? Some of us felt that Lythcott-Haims had led such a privileged life and yet seemed so very angry. Sen, at least, was better able to acknowledge and explain the anger she felt: "I have spent many decades carefully arranging my words, my gestures, my clothes, and my surroundings so that I do not appear threatening, unnatural, or ungrateful. ... [Still] I am angry at myself for hushing my native-born son when he complains that a teacher systematically confuses the names of all the brown boys in class." Much for all of us to reflect upon.

An interesting and honest take on what it is to experience racism and colorism as an immigrant in today's America. Sen is among the elite class of immigrants although her parents began humbly in the US. She made her way through Harvard and into a decent publishing role. Though the storytelling here is definitely compelling and the prose polished, there were times when one had to wonder why Sen's heightened sensitivities and awareness did not prompt her to do more for other less fortunate immigrants around her. As a first-generation immigrant myself, I have experienced many of the same things. But I've also had a lot of positive experiences and, having left India at an older age than Sen, I knew I was better off in racist America than patriarchal, classist, casteist India. This is not, by any means, to discount the writer's point of view or experiences but to offer a slightly different angle. It's a good book for white people to read, for sure. There are many things here I wish I could have told my white coworkers and neighbors.

In this memoir, Sharmila Sen uses her experience of immigrating from India to the U.S. to explore notions of race and whiteness. The strongest part of the book is the last chapter, where she solidifies her argument and broadens the conversation. Prior to the last chapter, it lacks an engaging arc or argument for me. She introduces a lot of interesting ideas, like white men "going native" and American vs. Americanized. However, I wish her perspective had been a little more contextualized and her arguments set up a little more clearly from the beginning.

More than just memoir of Indian immigration to the U.S., Sen's story is moving, interesting, and timely. Detailed are her unique experiences with prejudice, social classes, and hybridization as an Indian immigrant in the '80's. Also, rather than only critiquing our history as a means of exploring that particular brand of racism Sen first introduces an empathy invoking explanation of the poor in India whom she was taught to not even look at as a child. Sen shares stories of life in India and then, with an inaugural trip to the U.S., the reader is re-introduced to American culture. For instance, the reader awakes anew with Sen, as she recounts a morning in Eastern America where she smells bacon for the first time. The foreign and olfactory description of bacon's scent transports the reader. The family's attempts at assimilation are described as "white face" which allows an unique perspective on white privilege and the gravity of tainted race relations in American. NOT QUITE NOT WHITE offers the reader the chance to understand how race results in differing experiences, it is a chance to "climb in his skin and walk around" Such literature might just be our society's best hope at gaining understanding and empathy.
Finally, for a little bit of fun try partnering a reading of NOT QUITE NOT WHITE with one of FAHRENHEIT 451. Bradbury's homogenized society screams a warning against Sen's explanation about the power of "whiteness".