Tad's Top Ten Books for Healing Whiteness

Over the past decade, I feel like I've been somehow guided to just the right book at the right time. Each one taking me deeper in my own understanding and further along my own life path. Not in any linear sense, but more in a spiraling shape. Each one peeled back a different layer and allowed me to see new things. I've listed them in roughly the order I read them.

Of course, each of our journeys is so unique and the books that mean so much to one may not to another. Indeed, books themselves may not be useful to some.

But for what it's worth . . .


The Mist Filled Path: Celtic Wisdom for Exiles, Wanderers and Seekers - Frank MacEowen

This was one of the first books I read on Celtic spirituality and one of the most meaningful to me. It was neither abstract nor academic, but deeply personal. It shared Frank's profound story of reconnecting with his roots. Given that i was looking into my roots from a frame of healing racism and whiteness, the fact that Frank spoke directly and clearly to these issues in his book meant a great deal to me. Frank and I have since become dear friends. This is the book that convinced me a Celtic Indigenous Path did indeed exist.


A Handbook of the Scottish Gaelic World - Michael Newton

This book was a god-send. As I read it i kept thinking, "YES! I can't believe someone has written this book." It seemed to speak to every question i was living with. Right from the start he challenges modernism, racial contructions, and speaks directly to the dynamic of colonization as it existed for the Highlanders. With impeccable and detailed research he lays out the Gaelic worldview on a wide range of issues from: nature, to language, to belief, tradition and the structure of society, the oral tradition and a kick ass first chapter with some very good thoughts about "thinking about culture". This book delivers what too many lack - a political analysis for the historical and current realities of the Gael and how it all relates to the "modern" world in which we live.

A Language Older Than Words - Derrick Jensen

You will notice that Derrick takes four spots on my top ten list. There's a reason. Derrick is perhaps the most skilled, artful and powerful author I have ever experienced in his weaving together of some many of the strands of questioning i was living with: racism, indigenous issues, how did it all come to this? what's the way back home?, environmental issues etc. This is the book that truly broke my heart open and showed me the state of the world more clearly than i'd ever seen it. Devastating in its implications for civilization but brimming with hope in its belief of the higher possibilities in humanity. For me, the core of this book is how violence requires silence to continue - to abuse others, indigenous people and the natural world - they must be silenced in our experience.



The Culture of Make Believe - Derrick Jensen

Immediately after reading LOTW i read this. I think that this was the book that convinced me that there was no hope for modern civilization. Zero. It's the book that helped me see The Machine more clearly than ever and what it does to us - how it dehumanizes us. It helped me see that trying to save civilization is not only impossible but undesirable. It helped me see - contrary to new age claims - that the masses were not going to suddenly shift, voluntarily, to a sustainable way of life. Given that, the solution had to lie somewhere else. As the review says, "The book makes clear that it is only through understanding these atrocities, and by feeling the sorrow and despair caused by them, then moving through that despair, that we will be able to make significant movement toward halting them."


Listening to the Land - Derrick Jensen

This was actually Derrick's first book. It is a collection of interviews with environmentalists, feminists, theologians, philosophers, and Indians centering around the question: If the destruction of the natural world isn't making us happy, why are we doing it?" Starhawk, Jerry Mander, Ward Churchill etc. The wide range of responses from such elders and luminaries is incredible and gives so many lenses through which to look at the current situation.






The Four Fold Way: Walking the Paths of the Warrior, Teacher, Healer and Visionary - Angeles Arrien

This book is a weaving together of many spiritual and indigenous approaches from a cross cultural standpoint of "what is the common ground?" I can not speak to its accuracy but i can speak the the simple power of it. This is a book I will return to throughout my life for it's core wisdom on right living with a good heart.




Wasase: Indigenous Pathways of Action and Freedom - Taiaiake Alfred

I got an email from my friend, Shalene Jobin, who told me about the booklaunch for this is Edmonton and described Taiaiake's philosophy as "anarcho indingenism". I went to the website (www.wasase.org) and was blown away. There were PDF's, audio files and ten hours of video of Taiaiake teaching at his Indigenous Governance (iGov) program at UVic. I was blown away. I've never heard a more lucid analysis of colonization and what is required for decolonization. He unpacks and dismantles the economic, legalistic and armed resistance approaches and suggests another paths based on returning to the original teachings and engaging in a process of non-violent contention with the settler society. Taiaiake's work not only gave me a deeper understanding of the north american indigenous reality but also gave me so many frame works and goof thoughts for the process of decolonization that whites must go through as well.


Entering the Ghost River: Meditations on the Theory and Practice of Healing - Deena Metzger

I have many issues with the new age movement - it's dismissal of worldly, politica engagement as negative, people getting a week's worth of reiki training and opening a practice etc. Much of the new age seems to be a way for white folks to justify and maintain their current lifestyle. Deena (an american jew) delves deeply into the recovery of her indigenous mind and an indingeous perspective on healing. She lays out a view of healing that suggests a truly healing gesture is one that heals on every level. "Any one individual who is suffering a disease such as cancer or environmental illness, is also carrying it for the community, or as a member of the community. Their suffering reveals what is awry in the country at large." This book reminded me of the importance of spirit in this work. I've never read a more integrated perspective.


The Resurgence of the Real: Body, Nature and Place in a Hypermodern World - Charlene Spretnak

As I've read these books, the question has always been, "What is the heart of this all? What is the seed from which this sprouted? And what is the name for this illness that has changed us so deeply?" I think that modernism is as good a name as any. Charlene unpacks the modern worldview in the clearest and most explicit way i've ever seen done.





endgame: the collapse of civilization and the rebirth of community - derrick jensen

Of course, once we understand how very deep the problem is, what do we do about it? If civilization is inherently violent - then by not doing anything we are allowing that violence to continue.

This book deals directly with the question, "how do we stop the juggernaut?". My favorite part of this book are the 16 premises he lays out in the beginning. This book pushes you to agree or disgree. If you want a book to take you off the fence - this is it.