Summer Reading List
Below, we’ve curated a list of books and other publications we’ve read that we think everyone should read. We’ve included places to download or buy copies so you can enjoy these reads just as much as we have!
VIOLENCE PREVENTION & ORGANIZING
This book solidified the way we think about prevention. Instead of focusing on risk, the authors encourage us to build up protective skills and resources that don’t just stop at non-violence but aim for much higher goals like health and wellbeing.
Violence prevention must involve men. This book is foundational for feminist gender theory and has helped us empathize with men — a skill that is badly needed if we want to engage them in violence prevention!
Interested in the psychological processes that affect our behavior? This book lays out the theoretical groundwork for social norms, an increasingly promising approach to prevention that considers how others (and our perceptions of them) may influence our behavior more than we realize.
This book has been pretty pivotal for many people the field and we won’t fight it. For so long, we’ve treated prevention as an individual problem, but Hirsch and Kahn remind us that systemic injustices that are at the root of violence require systemic change to truly prevent violence.
Our hot take? You can’t call yourself an organizer until you’ve read this book. If you want to organize against violence, you need Hayes’ and Kaba’s perspective on how to be effective. Check your ego at the door, stop trying to be right, and move from performative influencer culture to radical change-maker.
ABOLITION
Still thinking prisons are a solution to violence? Davis’ brief history of prisons will have you thinking again. This book is foundational for anyone wanting to dip their toes into abolition.
A reflection on campus policies and violence prevention efforts, this book provides strategies for higher education professionals to bring abolition principles to campus. We haven’t read it yet but we’re excited to!
Process Improvement
Discover how to analyze workflows, identify inefficiencies, and implement smarter systems. This course helps you create processes that actually work, for a team or just for yourself.
Effective Communication
Learn how to communicate with clarity, confidence, and purpose. This course explores active listening, tone, body language, and message delivery for stronger, more impactful connections.
FOR THE LOVE OF WORK
The Revolution Will Not Be Funded
By INCITE!
ISBN: 978-0-8223-6900-4
Ever feel disenchanted by the change you thought nonprofits were capable of? Ever wonder why the funding landscape is so bleak? This book will change the way you view nonprofits and rethink the ways we’ve been taught to build radical movements
Work Won’t Love You Back
By Sarah Jaffe
ISBN: 978-1-5685-8939-8
“I don’t do nonprofit work to make good money, I do it because I’m passionate about the work” — said by too many people we love making less than a living wage for life-giving labor. The only brand new book on our list, we’re most excited to read this one!
Hope in the Dark
By Rebecca Solnit
ISBN: 978-1-6084-6576-7
It’s dark times, and thing feel hopeless. But people have felt this way before and persisted. This book offers ways and reasons to keep on going. We can’r wait to read it!
Let This Radicalize You
By Kelly Hayes and Mariame Kaba
Our hot take? You can’t call yourself an organizer until you’ve read this book. If you want to organize against violence, you need Hayes’ and Kaba’s perspective on how to be effective. Check your ego at the door, stop trying to be right, and move from performative influencer culture to radical change-maker.