You Mean It or You Don’t: James Baldwin’s Radical Challenge
by Jamie McGhee and Adam Hollowell
Broadleaf Books (May 31, 2022)
Hardcover, 196 pages
Nonfiction
Description of You Mean It or You Don’t: James Baldwin’s Radical Challenge by Jamie McGhee and Adam Hollowell
After a speech at UMass Amherst on February 28, 1984, James Baldwin was asked by a student: “You said that the liberal facade and being a liberal is not enough. Well, what is? What is necessary?” Baldwin responded, “Commitment. That is what is necessary. You mean it or you don’t.”
Taking up that challenge and drawing from Baldwin’s fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and interviews, You Mean It or You Don’t will spur today’s progressives from conviction to action. It is not enough, authors Hollowell and McGhee urge us, to hold progressive views on racial justice, LGBTQ+ identity, and economic inequality. True and lasting change demands a response to Baldwin’s radical challenge for moral commitment. Called to move from dreams of justice to living it out in communities, churches, and neighborhoods, we can show that we truly mean it.
Welcome to life with James Baldwin. It is raw and challenging, inspired and embodied, passionate and fully awake.

- ISBN: 9781506478944
- Imprint: Broadleaf Books
- Publisher: 1517 Media
- Parent Company: Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Books similiar to You Mean It or You Don’t: James Baldwin’s Radical Challenge may be found in the categories below:
- BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / African American & Black
- Religion / Christian Life / Social Issues
- Social Science / Discrimination & Race Relations