Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male Power

From the TIME 100 author of the Sunday Times and number 1 New York Times bestseller So You Want to Talk About Race, a subversive history of white male American identity -- now with a new preface.

'One of the most admired writers and "internet yellers" around... [Mediocre is] ever more vital... Oluo's meeting the time -- this movement against white supremacy and systems of oppression. But the question she keeps asking in her work: Are we?' IBRAM X KENDI

'Mediocre paints an urgent, honest picture of how white male identity has spawned unrest in the country's political ideology... It's a necessary read for the world we live in' CHIDOZIE OBASI, Harper's Bazaar

'[Ijeoma's] books don't come from a place of hate, but of determination to make change... [Mediocre is] another amazing book' TREVOR NOAH on The Daily Show

What happens to a country that tells generation after generation of white men that they deserve power? What happens when success is defined by status over women and people of colour, instead of actual accomplishments?

Through the last 150 years of American history -- from the post-Reconstruction South and the mythic stories of cowboys, to the present-day controversy over NFL protests and the backlash against the rise of women in politics -- Ijeoma Oluo exposes the devastating consequences of white male supremacy on women, people of colour, and white men themselves.

As provocative as it is essential, Mediocre investigates the real costs of white male power in order to imagine a new white male identity, one free from racism and sexism.


'[An] analytical and compassionate book' New Statesman

'Deftly combines history and sociological study with personal narrative, and the result is both uncomfortable and illuminating' Washington Post

'Ijeoma's sharp yet accessible writing about the American racial landscape made her 2018 book So You Want to Talk About Race an invaluable resource . . . Mediocre builds on this exemplary work, homing in on the role of white patriarchy in creating and upholding a system built to disenfranchise anyone who isn't a white male' TIME