Loose Canons: Notes on the Culture Wars

In the 10 pieces collected in Loose Canons, Gates, writing for the most part in a genial, conversational style, endorses multicultural education as a way of expanding social tolerance....A reformer, not a revolutionary, he wants to use the institutions that are in place, the university in particular, to further his plans for social progress....Gates the academic is more accessible than Morrison the popular novelist. --The Washington Post Book World

Should prove especially illuminating and reassuring to nonacademics. --The New York Times book Review

A good source of clear thinking and sensible reasoning on [multiculturalism]. --The Boston Globe

Gates, probably the best known and most controversial proponent of African American studies, has gathered here a group of his essays on the timely topic of multiculturalism....An excellent addition to all academic libraries and a necessary purchase for any library interested in a serious discussion of multiculturalism. --Library Journal

Lucid, stimulating, and often entertaining. Gates is one of the very few contemporary critics whose work is actually fun to absorb. --Newsday

In these incisive and readable essays, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., is at once sympathetic, funny, and cautionary in making the case for cultural pluralism and the revision of the literary canon. --Gerald Graff, University of Chicago

Loose Canons is an inside job, the work of a man who has mastered the arcane politics and encoded language of the canon makers; it's an arsenal of ideas in the cultural wars. But it is also the outpouring of a humane, witty, and truly civilized mind--and that's exactly why Loose Canons strikes so hard and true. --Los Angeles Times

Witty and laced with anecdotes...these readable essays serve well as an introduction to an often daunting field. --Voice Literary Supplement

Gates...has brio, deep learning, and wit....He is also a gift to his readers and a rarity in contemporary critical circles. --Commonweal