Paula’s debut book, The Emotional Politics of Racism: How Feelings Trump Facts in an Era of Colorblindness, was published by Stanford University Press in 2015, and named one of the Ten Must-Read Academic Books of 2015 by Flavorwire.

By examining the role of socially shared emotions in contemporary instances of racial violence and discrimination, this book argues that people’s emotional perceptions about crime, terrorism, immigration, and welfare programs often trump what empirical facts say about these issues. Thus, in understanding and challenging systemic oppression, it is critical to take the unique logics of racialized emotions seriously.

"The Emotional Politics of Racism is a sustained act of ethical witnessing. Paula Ioanide offers fresh insights into the relationship between social order and alienation, showing the interrelation of explanatory and affective modes that perpetuate gendered racial hierarchy. A must read for all students of racial capitalism."

—Ruth Wilson Gilmore, author of Golden Gulag: Prisons, Surplus, Crisis, and Opposition in Globalizing California

Read more here.

Along with Dr. Felice Blake and Dr. Alison Reed, Paula co-edited an anthology titled Antiracism Inc.: Why the Way We Talk about Racial Justice Matters (Punctum Books) about new ways of struggling toward racial justice in a world that constantly steals and misuses antiracist ideas and practices.

Featuring scholars, poets, and activists, the collection seeks to address the growing phenomenon of appropriating, incorporating, and neutralizing antiracist discourses to perpetuate injustice.

In addition to critical essays by Felice Blake (“How Does Black Cultural Criticism ‘Work’ in the Age of Antiracist Incorporation?”), Kevin Fellezs (“Nahenahe (Soft, Sweet, Melodious), the Sound of Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) Refusal”), Daniel Martinez HoSang (“A Wider Type of Freedom”), Paula Ioanide (“Defensive Appropriations”), George Lipsitz (“The Logic of ‘Illogical’ Opposition: Tools and Tactics for Tough Times”), Alison Reed (“Gentrifying Disciplines: The Institutional Management of Trauma and Creative Dissent”), Phia S. Salter + Glenn Adams (“Provisional Strategies for Decolonizing Consciousness”), and Barbara Tomlinson (“Wicked Problems and Intersectionality Telephone”), the volume also includes poetry by Dubian Ade, Jari Bradley, Dahlak Brathwaite, Corinne Contreras, Ebony P. Donnley, Colin Masashi Ehara, David Scott (YDS), Daniel Hershel Silber-Baker, and Sophia Terazawa, as well as interviews with Diana Zuñiga (CURB, Californians United for a Responsible Budget) and with Gaby Hernandez and Marissa Garcia (PODER, People Organizing for the Defense and Equal Rights of Santa Barbara Youth).

Forthcoming Winter 2019.