Author Steve Luxenberg On Racial Strife from Plessy v. Ferguson To Modern Detroit

Luxenberg is a hometown Detroiter and the author of “Separate: The Story of Plessy v. Ferguson, and America’s Journey from Slavery to Segregation”

Jake Neher/WDET
Jake Neher/WDET

Author and hometown Detroiter Steve Luxenberg is back in town promoting his book “Separate, which explores the human stories behind the Plessy v. Ferguson Supreme Court decision, the ruling that enshrined the idea of “separate but equal” in American law until the mid-20th Century.

Luxenberg is back in Detroit this week talking about his book. He’ll be at the Detroit Public Library Main Branch on Woodward at 6 p.m., and will be speaking on Wednesday in Livonia and Ann Arbor.

Find out more about the events here.

“I’m not a constitutional scholar or a legal historian, I wanted to tell the human stories” of Plessy v. Ferguson, says Luxenberg on Detroit Today with Stephen Henderson.

Luxenberg also talks about how the stories of that case relate to race relations in 2019.

“Race is our national conversation, we’re either talking about it or avoiding talking about it,” he says. 

Click on the player above to hear author Steve Luxenberg on Detroit Today with Stephen Henderson.

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