Ghosts of Segregation

American Racism, Hidden in Plain Sight

By Richard Frishman, B. Brian Foster
Timeless witness: majestic tree stands as a solemn reminder of america's racial divide.
Title: Ghosts of Segregation
Author: Richard Frishman, B. Brian Foster
ISBN: 9781250831682
ON SALE: 02/06/2024

Buy Now

ISBN: 9781250831682
Hardcover

From award-winning photojournalist Richard Frishman comes a collection of photographs documenting America’s history of segregation, slavery, and institutional racism hidden in plain sight, accompanied by hard-hitting personal essays from University of Virginia professor of sociology and Black culture B. Brian Foster and with a foreword by National Book Award winner Imani Perry

Beginning in 2018, Richard Frishman embarked on a 35,000-mile journey, crossing the United States several times, traveling from his home state of Washington to Maine, from Mississippi to Michigan, and everywhere in between. Frishman was driven by a deep concern for capturing traces of the nation’s history of segregation, slavery, and institutional racism embedded in everyday American architecture. Frishman spent the next five years capturing photographs of structures like the New Orleans Slave Exchange, old “colored entrances” at movie theaters in Seattle and Texas, formerly segregated beaches in Los Angeles, and the former site of New York City’s slave market.

As Frishman was traveling the country, his collaborator, noted sociologist Dr. B. Brian Foster, was writing about economic development, Black community life, and the blues in his home state of Mississippi. Foster adds to this collection seven essays of stirring prose and intimate storytelling. Whether reflecting on his relationship to his grandmother and her archive of family photos or chronicling his experiences working as a professor at the University of Mississippi and the University of Virginia, Foster adds layers of emotional resonance and sharp insight to the photographic collection with his essays, speaking to the shared memories, living histories, rippling beauty, and ongoing struggles of Black life in the United States.

Within this immersive collection, readers will witness and learn of histories startling, stirring, and thought-provoking: Histories of white supremacist violence and systemic racism. Histories of segregated bathrooms, beaches, churches, dining areas, doors, hospitals, hotels, waiting rooms, and water. Histories of Black aliveness and aspiration. Histories of Black migration, Black entrepreneurship, Black protest and organizing, Black singing and dancing, and Black placemaking.This remarkable book brings home a powerful truth: these ghosts of segregation haunt us because they are very much alive. It also reveals how our surroundings bear witness to history, reminding us where we have been, where we are now, and crucially asking, Where do we go from here?

A thoughtful man with a beard, wearing a satin-finish jacket, engages in conversation against an orange backdrop.
B. Brian Foster is a writer, storyteller, and sociologist from Shannon, Mississippi. He earned his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and currently works as Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Virginia. His award-winning book I Don't Like the Blues: Race, Place, and the Backbeat of Black Life chronicles Black community life and blues tourism in Clarksdale, Mississippi. Brian has also directed two award-winning short films and written for Bitter Southerner, CNN, Delish.com, Esquire, the Ford Foundation, Veranda magazine, and the Washington Post, among others.
A mature man with striking gray hair and a full beard, piercing gaze, and a slight, confident smile, wearing a dark purple shirt and standing against a blurred natural backdrop.
Richard Frishman’s photographs explore how the built environment reveals our cultural histories. In 2021 Frishman was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for photography. His current documentary project, Ghosts of Segregation, explores the vestiges of racial oppression in the landscape of the United States.

Frishman’s photography is included in a wide range collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Photography, and the OAS Art Museum of the Americas. His work has garnered numerous awards, including the 2019 Review Santa Fe Curator's Choice Award (juror: Makeda Best), the 2019 PhotoNOLA Portfolio Award, two Sony World Photography Awards (2018), a Communication Arts Photography Award (2018), and a Photo District News Photo Annual Award (2018). In 1983, he was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in feature photography.

He lectures around the United States about the intersection of the designed environment, history, and social issues.

Praise for Richard Frishman, B. Brian Foster

"Throughout Ghosts of Segregation, the heart and mind are full to bursting with depth of feeling and depth of thought. I can’t imagine a more beautiful creation.”

Hilton Als
Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic

“In the haunting photographs of Ghosts of Segregation, the scars of racism hide in plain sight.”

Boston Globe

"Ghosts of Segregation adds powerfully to the tapestry of remembrance and reckoning."

NWTheater

"This should be on the coffee tables and kitchen tables of every household in America."

Danielle Moodie
The Daily Beast podcast The New Abnormal
Two compact discs (CDs) with shiny, reflective surfaces are overlapping each other on a white background. The discs display a spectrum of colors due to the light reflection, creating a rainbow-like effect.

"*" indicates required fields

Step 1 of 8

Who would you rather spend time with?*

Connect with

Celadon

Sign up for our newsletter to see book giveaways, news, and more!