Some Americans cling desperately to the myth that we are living in a post-racial society, that the election of the first Black president spelled the doom of racism. In fact, racist thought is alive and well in America--more sophisticated and more insidious than ever.

Part I. Cotton Mather -- Human hierarchy -- Origins of racist ideas -- Coming to America -- Saving souls, not bodies -- Black hunts -- Great awakening -- Part II. Thomas Jefferson -- Enlightenment -- Black exhibit -- Created equal -- Uplift suasion -- Big bottoms -- Colonization -- Part III. William Lloyd Garrison -- Gradual equality -- Imbruted or civilized -- Soul -- The impending crisis -- History's emancipator -- Ready for freedom? -- Reconstructing slavery -- Reconstructing blame -- Part IV. W.E.B. Du Bois -- Renewing the south -- Southern horrors -- Black Judases -- Great white hopes -- The Birth of a Nation -- Media suasion -- Old deal -- Freedom brand -- Massive resistance -- Part V. Angela Davis -- The act of civil rights -- Black power -- Law and order -- Reagan's drugs -- New Democrats -- New Republicans -- 99.9 percent the same -- The extraordinary Negro -- Epilogue.