We are Power: How Nonviolent Activism Changed the World
By Todd Hasak-Lowy
Publisher: Abrams Books for Young Readers Copyright Year: 2020 ISBN/ISSN: 9781419741111
Review
There has never been a time when a book is more relevant than this one. Hasak-Lowy has compiled a collection of short biographies on civil disobedience, nonviolent protest, and student activism that both build on one another and could be read as standalones. Readers will learn about India achieving independence from Britain, the Women's Suffrage movement, the Civil Rights movement, Czech independence from Russia and communism as well as the farm workers' movement. This nonfiction text could be used in connection with Chelsea Clinton's It's Your World: Get Informed, Get Inspired, & Get Going! (Philomel Books 2017). Translator, professor, adult writer, and middle grade author of 33 Minutes (Aladdin 2017), Todd Hasak-Lowy has organized five chapters on Mohandas Gandhi, Alice Paul, Martin Luther King Jr., Cesar Chavez, and Vaclav Havel of the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia. The conclusion includes Greta Thunberg and the March for Our Lives movement. Hasak-Lowy explains that history as a subject is often taught around wars, yet many vital developments that improved the livelihoods of countless Americans were achieved through nonviolent resistance. All individuals mentioned suffered harassment or imprisonment by performing similar kinds of intentional law-breaking, such as pickets, boycotts, strikes, speech making, and banner construction. As a forewarning, the "n-word" is mentioned in the Martin Luther King Jr. chapter in its historical context. Photos complement the text. It is the hope that all who read this text come away inspired to think globally and act locally.
Reviewer: Laura Dooley-Taylor, Librarian, Lake Zurich Middle School North, Hawthorn Woods , IL
Rating: Highly Recommended
Grade (as stated by Reviewer/SLC): 6-8
Review Date: March 1, 2020
We Are Power brings to light the incredible individuals who have used nonviolent activism to change the world. The book explores questions such as what is nonviolent resistance and how does it work? In an age when armies are stronger than ever before, when guns seem to be everywhere, how can people confront their adversaries without resorting to violence themselves? Through key international movements as well as people such as Gandhi, Alice Paul, Martin Luther King, Cesar Chavez, and Václav Havel, this book discusses the components of nonviolent resistance. It answers the question "Why nonviolence?" by showing how nonviolent movements have succeeded again and again in a variety of ways, in all sorts of places, and always in the face of overwhelming odds. The book includes endnotes, a bibliography, and an index.
Media Type Book, eBook
Binding HC
# Pages 320
Price 17.99
Grade (as stated by publisher) 5-9
Grade (as stated by Reviewer/SLC) 6-8
Genre Nonfiction
Sub-Genre Biographies
Content Subject 1 Civics & Government
Content Subject 2 Community & Everyday Life
Time Period Modern World: 1800 to present day
Region NA
Entry ID: 2231105