For over two decades, Adolph Reed has offered a compelling, contrarian view of urban poverty through his writings on the “underclass.” This article shows the distinctiveness of Reed’s account: his emphasis on the “underclass” as a political classification rather than as an economic or political condition, his focus on relationships among groups rather than on the deficiencies of one group, and his attention to how seemingly anti-poverty constituencies, in fact, reinforce the “underclass” idea.
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ReedAdolph L.Jr. (1992) 1999. “The ‘Underclass’ as Myth and Symbol: The Poverty of Discourse about Poverty.” In Stirrings in the Jug: Black Politics in the Post-Segregation Era, edited by ReedAdolph L.Jr.179-96. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
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ReedAdolph L.Jr. (1995) 1999. “Sources of Demobilization in the New Black Political Regime: Incorporation, Ideological Capitulation, and Radical Failure in the Post-Segregation Era.” In Stirrings in the Jug: Black Politics in the Post-Segregation Era, edited by ReedAdolph L.Jr.117-59. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
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ReedAdolph L.Jr.2002. “Unraveling the Relation of Race and Class in American Politics.”Political Power and Social Theory15:265-74.
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ReedAdolph L.Jr.2010. “The ‘Color Line’ Then and Now: The Souls of Black Folk and the Changing Contexts of Black American Politics.” In Renewing Black Intellectual History: The Ideological and Material Foundations of African American Thought, edited by ReedAdolph L.Jr.WarrenKenneth W.DubeyMadhuJonesWilliam P.MitchellMichelleReedToure F.RobinsonDean E.. . . SteinJudith252-303. Boulder: Paradigm Publishers.
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ReedAdolph L.Jr.ChowkwanyunMerlin. 2012. “Race, Class, Crisis: The Discourse of Racial Disparity and Its Analytical Discontents.”Socialist Register48:149-75.
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