This book's 40 engaging articles--selected for their importance as well as for their readability--introduce readers to the major topics and themes that frame the study of race in the United States. Organized into seven major thematic parts, the book begins with basic concepts and then moves on to explore social structural and institutional analyses of race and ethnicity. Part I examines how race is socially constructed. Part II explores how historical patterns of inclusion and exclusion have established the realities of racial and ethnic inequality today. Part III examines racial stereotypes, prejudice, and forms of racism, including how they are influenced by popular culture. Part IV includes articles on racial identity and how race plays out in everyday life. Part V looks at the overlapping systems of race, class, and gender inequality. Part VI examines patterns of racial inequality in five major institutions: work, families and communities, housing and education, health care, and criminal justice. Part VII concludes the book by looking at large-scale contexts of change, ranging from individual to societal-level change.