The Ferguson Report: An Erasure

A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR A meditation on our times, cast through a reconsideration of the Justice Department's investigation of the Ferguson Police Department

In August 2014, Michael Brown-a young, unarmed Black man-was shot to death by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri. What followed was a period of protests and turmoil, culminating in an extensive report that was filed by the Department of Justice detailing biased policing and court practices in the city. It is a document that exposes the racist policies and procedures that have become commonplace-from disproportionate arrest rates, to flagrant violence directed at the Black community. It is a report that remains as disheartening as it is damning.

Now, award-winning poet Nicole Sealey revisits the investigation in a book that redacts the report, an act of erasure that reimagines the original text as it strips it away. While the full document is visible in the background-weighing heavily on the language Sealey has preserved-it gives shape and disturbing context to what remains.

Illuminating what it means to live in this frightening age, and what it means to bear witness, The Ferguson Report: An Erasure is an engrossing meditation on one of the most important texts of our time.