This book brings together essays by some of the most influential writers of our time - including Derrick Bell, bell hooks, Simone de Beauvoir, Judith Butler, and Deborah Tannen - offering a systematic and integrated portrait of social inequality in America today. Unusual in its combination of both statistical analyses and descriptive accounts, this up-to-date book is a cogent introduction to race, class, gender and other current dimensions of social and economic inequalities. It also serves as an invaluable reference source for any university, research, or large public library.