Riveting.weaves together a fascinating if powerfully disturbing series of examples of stranger hatred (and exploitation) alongside the internal dissent such encounters have always prompted.Throughout his analysis, Makari brings an impressive range of reading to bear, wearing his learning lightly and interspersing fascinating capsule biographies of transformation figures like Raphael Lemkin, Carl Schmitt and Theodor Adorno with literary commentary on Aldous Huxley, Richard Wright and James Baldwin.All the material is enthralling.--Thomas Chatterton Williams, New York Times Book Review By shedding light on the trajectory of xenophobia during its 150-year history, this skillfully written account helps point us towards ways to combat it.--Rachel Newcomb, Washington Post [A] compelling story of racial and ethnic animosity.--Adam Kuper, Wall Street Journal [An] illuminating, significant historical study. A timely and thorough investigation of a cultural plague.

--Kirkus Reviews (starred review) With elegance and passionate conviction, George Makari deconstructs one of the ugliest problems of our time.With penetrating insight, he reveals the history of a grave weakness that is one of the wildest threats against coherent democracy and human kindness. Of Fear and Strangers is at once a work of dispassionate reporting and brave moral righteousness--Andrew Solomon, author of Far from the Tree With astonishing range and lucid erudition, George Makari has again given us an intellectual history that illustrates how little we know about the ideas that animate and rule our world.Breathtaking with its learnedness, dazzling as an easy-to-read narrative of complex ideas and knotty concepts.In an epoch where nations often appear cleaved into equally disdainful mobs, Makari makes an airtight case that an enhanced understanding of the concept 'xenophobia' can serve as a skeleton key that will help unlock many of the psychic terrors currently haunting our cognitive processes and social worlds.--Anthony Walton, author of Mississippi: An American Journey Drawing on philosophy, psychology, sociology, and other disciplines, George Makari's beautiful writing delivers a strikingly original history. A sheer delight to read, this book is a gift for all.--Zia Haider Rahman, author of In the Light of What We Know.