CHAIN OF IDEAS w/ Dr. Ibram X. Kendi | A Busboys and Poets Books Presentati
About this Event
Join us to learn why “we must work across race and class lines to eradicate social ills and eliminate fascism”
The acclaimed author of How to Be an Antiracist and the National Book Award winner Stamped from the Beginning charts how "great replacement theory" has become a dominant political idea of our time and ushered in an antidemocratic age.
Recall the words chanted in Charlottesville, Virginia: "You will not replace us!" Recall the string of mass shooters across the globe--in Oslo, Christchurch, Buffalo, El Paso, and Pittsburgh--who claimed their crimes were a defense against "White genocide." Recall business and media figures cultivating anxiety and furor over demographic change. These incidents only scratch the surface: Popular and ruling politicians in every region of the world have expressed some version of great replacement theory, eroding democratic norms in the name of preventing demographic change.
The term was coined in 2011 by a French novelist who argued that Black and Brown immigrants were "invading" Europe, brought by shadowy elites to "replace" the White population. From there, politicians and theorists in the United States and elsewhere repackaged it as a story of "globalists" welcoming "migrant criminals" and promoting diversity to take away the jobs, cultures, electoral power, and very lives of White people. Over time, great replacement theory has expanded those under threat to include citizens, men, Jews, Christians, heterosexuals, and ethnic majorities in countries as distinct as Russia, El Salvador, Brazil, Italy, and India, all targeted with the message that they are facing an existential attack that only a strongman can prevent.
In Chain of Ideas, internationally bestselling author Ibram X. Kendi offers an unsettling but indispensable global history of how great replacement theory brought humanity into this authoritarian age--and how we can free ourselves from it.
Dr. Ibram X. Kendi is joining us on the Busboys stage to share more about “the arguably premier racist trope of our time” and how we can combat this “fashionably fascist thought that houses old wine in new skins” (Kirkus Reviews). Copies of the book will be available for purchase during and after the event, and Dr. Kendi will be signing following the program.
This event is free and open to all. Doors open to guests at 5:30pm. Our program begins at 6:00 pm, and will be followed by an audience Q&A. Copies of CHAIN OF IDEAS will be available for purchase before and after the event. Please note that this event is in person.
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DR. IBRAM X. KENDI is one of the world’s foremost historians of racism and a leading antiracist scholar. He is the Carter G. Woodson Endowed Chair in History at Howard University, and the inaugural director of Howard’s Institute for Advanced Study.
Dr. Kendi is the author of Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, making him the youngest author to win that award. Stamped from the Beginning was adapted into highly acclaimed books for young readers and an Emmy-nominated documentary on Netflix. Dr. Kendi also authored the international bestseller, How to Be an Antiracist, which was described in the New York Times as “the most courageous book to date on the problem of race in the Western mind.” In total, Dr. Kendi has published eighteen books for adults and children, including twelve New York Times Best Sellers, five of which were #1 New York Times Best Sellers. Time magazine named Dr. Kendi one of the 100 Most Influential People in the world. He was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship, popularly known as the Genius Grant. His latest critically acclaimed book and Best Seller is Chain of Ideas: The Origins of Our Authoritarian Age, which was published in March.
BOOK DETAILS
Chain of Ideas
The Origins of Our Authoritarian Age
By Ibram X. Kendi
March 17, 2026 | Hardcover, 592 pages, $35
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