Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America

Roxane

Rating: really liked it
A formidable essay collection about identity, citizenship, and the arbitrary borders imposed by white supremacy. Exceptionally well written and researched. Very timely.

Elyse Walters

Rating: really liked it
Audiobook....
excellent!!!! Love the author!!!

Laila covered many topics —
An excellent look at becoming a citizen ...
I found the nitty gritty details fascinating...
Our daughter immigrated to Canada and went through similar things.

Lailia’s personal story of reading Huckleberry Finn to her daughter ( and their mother/ daughter discussion), was moving and compelling - I listened to that part twice — Mark Twain’s purpose of Huck’s relationship with Tom.

The $450 a month rental with ‘fleas’... was gripping ...
Her ‘fainting’ in a coffee shop made me want to hug and feed Laila —- I SERIOUSLY LIKE THIS WOMAN!!!!

I loved her novel “The Moors Account”.... and it was a treat to listen to her essays. Such a lovely well written- valuable and enjoyable book.

She covers a lot of relevant topics... personal stories....
including a work situation of TOTAL INJUSTICE....
Fired for having INTEGRITY....
I wanted to kick the guy in the balls!!

A co- worker who was sexually assaulted,

She wrote about rape, poverty, class, injustice, teaching, book tours, voting, blacks, immigration from many aspects, Bush, Trump, being an American from Morocco

Loved this short audiobook...
and I’ve much admiration and respect for Laila Lalami!

luce (currently recovering from a hiatus)

Rating: really liked it
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Drawing from her own experiences as a Moroccan immigrant living in the States, in Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America Laila Lalami presents us with an impassioned and thoughtful social commentary. With piercing clarity, she touches upon Islamophobia, xenophobia, racism, and sexism. She reflects on the many flaws and conditions of citizenship, specifically American citizenship, and on the many ways, it fails people. I truly appreciated the way she discusses topical and oh so important social issues, and the lucidity of her arguments: from discussing the way citizenship is equated with whiteness, white privilege and white fragility, racial profiling, borders, racist rhetorics and the vilification of immigrants, inhumane legislations, the notion of ‘assimilation’, belonging, etc. Throughout this collection of essays, Lalami raises many thought-provoking points and makes many illuminating observations. While Lalami does discuss other people’s experiences, often providing statistics or citing specific incidents/events, her own personal experiences inform much of her writing, which makes it all the more affecting. I admired the way she would attempt to relate to the kind of people I personally would write off as c*nts while also fully acknowledging how frustrating a position she is often made to be in (that of educating bigoted people).
While she does write about subjects that are ‘American’ specific, such as applying for citizenship in America, the issues underlying her essays should not concern exclusively an American readership. Although I did gain insight into processes I am not familiar with, throughout this collection Lalami delves into topics that will undoubtedly resonate with many readers outside of the States.

My only quibble is that some of her essays could have integrated a more intersectional approach. For instance, while Lalami does include 'asides' discussing gender inequality and #metoo, she barely acknowledges lgbtq+ related issues.
Curiously enough this is another case where I find myself liking the non-fictional work of an author whose fiction I low-key did not get on with…I would definitely recommend this one and I am determined to read (and hopefully like) Lalami's The Moor's Account.

Kathleen

Rating: really liked it
Does U.S. citizenship ensure that society and the Government will treat you equally to other citizens? Lalami has written a series of insightful essays exploring that question. Lalami was raised in Morocco; but pursued graduate studies in the U.S. She eventually fell in love and married a U.S. citizen and became a naturalized citizen herself in 2000. After studying American civics for her naturalization test, she was struck by the disparity between the ideal she was taught, and the reality of being an immigrant, a woman, an Arab, and a Muslim.

I was unaware that border patrol agents rely on 136 checkpoints that are up to 100 miles inside of U.S. borders to stop and question people they may feel are not citizens. Not many citizens carry around the documents proving their citizenship. So not surprisingly, hundreds of U.S. citizens are wrongfully arrested and held in immigration jails. And even persons with citizenship are not treated equally. Black and Latinx citizens face greater scrutiny from police and more severe punishment for the crimes they commit compared to white citizens. Markers of identity (not only race, but gender, LGBT sexual orientation, or even religion) impact the respect and treatment they receive.

Recommend these well-written essays.

Lupita Reads

Rating: really liked it
CONDITIONAL CITIZENS is a collection of essays that explores what it means to belong in America when you’ve become a naturalized citizen. It unveils the privileges of citizenship while also pointing at all the instabilities of it for someone who doesn’t “look” American. It’s a call to action for a necessary and radical shift in what society views and deems acceptable for who fits into the definition of American. It’s probably one of the most potent books about citizenship that I have read. It’s one of those books I wish could be required reading for every single American.

Siria

Rating: really liked it
Conditional Citizens is a beautifully written, clear and concise look at what it is to be a naturalised American citizen whose relationship with her adopted country is fraught, interspersed with some truth-telling about the ways in which the racism and gender discrimination embedded in contemporary U.S. society makes citizenship conditional for so many. I can't help but feel that the kinds of people who most need to read this book are, however, the least likely to do so.

Jessica

Rating: really liked it
Thanks to the publisher for this free review copy.

Incredible incredible incredible book. A must read!

“It is because I love America that I cannot be quiet about her faults. The price of my belonging cannot be my silence”

“Sometimes, I wonder what this county might look like if no one had to go bankrupt because of medical costs; no one had to be made homeless because of low wages; and no one had to go into debt to receive an education. I don’t think that’s a particularly radical thing to imagine.”

Conditional Citizens is one of the best books I’ve read in 2020. It blew me away. I listened to the audiobook but went back to the physical copy and highlighted basically every page.

Lalami shares her observations and personal experiences about what it means to belong in America, and she contrasts and compares it with her upbringing in Morocco. Each essay tied really well to the overall fact that all citizens do not enjoy full freedoms in this country. She expertly balanced her personal experiences with cultural observations and academic references to support her statements.

The topics discussed aren’t particularly new or revelatory, but the way in which she frames each issue on what freedom should look like really focused on what it means to be treated as a conditional citizen in your own country. Where the poor are blamed for their circumstances, where nonwhites are policed and punished and disproportionate rates, where voter suppression is prevalent, Muslims are treated with suspicion, systemic racism harms the Black community, where Latinx folks are at a greater risk of being profiled and detained, and on and on. She writes, “Each year, hundreds of U.S. citizens are wrongly held in immigration jails, where they have to wait for months, and in a few cases years, to go before a federal judge.”

What I appreciated most was the last chapter where she describes what an equal society would look like. Where women are believed, the right to vote is universal, body autonomy for all, the right to education, healthcare, religion, basic standards of living, and more are enjoyed by everyone. It’s not radical to want these basic things for ALL Americans and we have to stop framing it as such!

If you’re a fan of nonfiction that explores the dynamics of race, immigration, gender, and class in America, definitely pick this one up. I’d also recommend this as a complement to The Undocumented Americans, as both have a similar style of slapping you with truth bombs on every page.

Paige

Rating: really liked it
U.S. citizenship is a birthright for some and a pillar of the American Dream for others. Those who are born with it may take it for granted, but plenty of immigrants dream of the day they will become official citizens. They jump through hoops to fulfill requirements and pass a test—all with the end goal of the naturalization ceremony: that one moment they can stand in front of their fellow country men and women and say “now I’m one of you.” But, as Laila Lalami discovered when she emigrated from Morocco, even fulfilling all the requirements of citizenship can’t guarantee the same rights and protections for everyone in this country.

New this September from Pantheon, “Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America” by Pulitzer Prize-finalist Laila Lalami offers the literary world an intimate look into what it’s like to become an American, and indeed what it means to be an American at all. This book neatly straddles the line between memoir and essay, mounting a topic that has always been poignant, but is even more relevant to the wider political and humanitarian conversation in the US in 2020. For readers searching for pertinent non-fiction, this is a must read.

At the time of the founding of the U.S., the full rights of citizenship were only afforded to white male landowners. Over the years, amendments, laws, and the slow evolution of culture have extended more and more of the privileges of citizenships to women, people of color and those too poor to own land, but these little half-steps forward have failed to present equality for all even today. Lalami, a muslim woman who was raised in a comparatively poor family, has never fit the image of a citizen that the founding fathers had in mind. Upon arriving in the U.S. as a student, she didn’t even know which box to check for race when asked if she was black or white in the demographic portion of a standardized test.

She discusses issues of race, class, religion, sexuality and gender, citing specific ways in which each can act as a barrier to keep specific groups of people for achieving the American Dream. She exposes systems of oppression in ways that can be eye-opening to those who have been lucky enough to avoid them in their own lives. She skillfully weaves tales of personal struggles with events that have made national or even international headlines over the last few decades. Perhaps the most remarkable part of this book is that it manages to expose so many systems of suppression and maltreatment without losing hope. Not every American was invited to take place in the conversations that built these systems, but, as Lalami demonstrates by writing this book, maybe we can all have a hand in reshaping the country we want to live in.

Rebecca

Rating: really liked it
Listened to the audiobook.

I wanted to like this so badly. I think it’s great that there are so many facts laced in her memoir. It’s a very well researched book. But man, there’s was very very little touching on the privilege the author had in her path to citizenship.

Denise

Rating: really liked it
Powerful and extremely well written, this essay collection explores the disparity between being a US citizen and being treated equally and feeling like one belongs, grounded in the author's own experience of becoming a naturalized citizen in 2000 and what that has meant for her in subsequent years, especially in light of changing attitudes in the wake of 9/11. But she goes far beyond her own story as well, touching on many different ways in which anyone who doesn't belong to the straight white male category faces some manner of discrimination or other that renders them in some way conditional citizens, for whom equality exists only on paper if at all. While Lalami looks specifically at the US, much of what she writes about applies equally across the Western world.

Jaclyn (sixminutesforme)

Rating: really liked it
Laila Lalami’s essay collection, CONDITIONAL CITIZENS (@pantheonbooks #gifted), has been a particularly striking read in the lead up to the 2020 election in the US. She grapples with what it means to be an American at the moment, and what her own experience has been since moving from Morocco for graduate study. This is an infinitely complex question, particularly when also considering race and religion and class and caste, which Lalami discusses in these essays. Her examination of borders particularly struck me, including the way people are “othered” as part of the process inherent in articulating any border. The way she draws on personal experience and policies and judicial decisions was striking and poignant. She also engaged in discussions around whiteness and caste which I think readers of recent nonfiction like Isabel Wilkerson’s CASTE or Claudia Rankine’s JUST US will find thematic overlaps in. I think this adds an interesting lens to some of these broader discussions. To use her own wording, there is much in these essays that “disturbs the silence” around many of these topics, while also engaging in these conversations raised in many texts that have come out this year alone.
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I can’t recommend this enough, and it’s prompted me to get to Lalami’s fiction as a priority (@sumaiyya.books assures me I will also love it!).

Jyotsna

Rating: really liked it
Actual Rating: 4.8 stars

Conditional citizenship is characterized by the burden of having to educate white Americans about all the ways in which one is different from them.

Laila Lalami, a naturalized citizen of the United States, talks about how immigrants are treated as second class citizens in the country. An interesting take on institutionalised racism, citizenship and sexism in her home country. Brownie points for the well thought, well written points.

However, the book is pretty much US centric and talks about racism in the West, especially in the US, hence not a complete 5 ⭐ from my side.

Read for the Quarterfinals of the Booktube Prize 2021, this one made it to the Semifinals.

Ranking - 4th (out of 6 books)

(For more insight, please watch the video on my YT channel)

Sanjida

Rating: really liked it
I didn't really learn anything new to me here. But I'm rounding this memoir/meditation on identity and belonging to a 4 because I felt so seen by the author. Reading this felt good to my soul.

Samantha

Rating: really liked it
4.5 stars

I'm really impressed with how concise and well-structured this book is. Each chapter circles a different aspect of immigration (borders, assimilation, caste) and combining research and personal narrative, Lalami expertly explains the nuance and complicated nature of coming to America. I continue to be astounded by how little white people here (of all political persuasions) understand about the immigration process. You do not just pop over, answer some questions, and obtain citizenship! It often takes years, decades, and even after that, expectations of immigrants are high and they often face injustices that make it hard to succeed, hard not to still feel othered.

Because of my background, much of this wasn't new to me, but it's necessary reading for everyone.

Caroline

Rating: really liked it
Nothing new if you’ve been paying attention. If you haven’t you’re unlikely to choose it.