Description: In Black Voices in the Halls of Power, authors Jennifer R. Garcia, Christopher T. Stout, and Katherine Tate explore how US lawmakers use racial rhetoric to elevate the voice of Black communities, influence policy, and shape voter trust. Through a combination of data-driven research and accessible storytelling, the book uncovers the strategic ways politicians speak about race, revealing how rhetoric impacts policymaking and representation and offering fresh insights into race and power in American politics. The book explores how politicians craft messages to appeal to diverse audiences and use political communication to advance legislative priorities. It also examines how legislators' engagement in racial outreach affects voter attitudes. Given the increasingly important role of race on the national political stage in the US, the book provides a critical yet engaging examination of race, rhetoric, and representation in Congress.
Brief description: Katherine Tate is Professor of Political Science at Brown University. She is the author of several books, including the award-winning Black Faces in the Mirror: African Americans and Their Representatives in the US Congress (2004).
Review Quotes: 'Black Voices in the Hall of Power transcends typical accounts of descriptive, symbolic, and substantive representation with a commanding, multi-method analysis of interviews, survey experiments, legislative activity, and hundreds of thousands of press releases and tweets to demonstrate how Black legislators' rhetorical representation reshapes the legislative landscape for Black constituents.' LaGina Gause, University of California, San Diego