Cooper's concession in paragraph 3 that outsiders may not act in bad faith chiefly serves to

1Writing about public debate over race and the postwar South, Cooper observes that Black Americans are frequently discussed while being rarely consulted. Within that already neglected perspective, she argues, the voice of Black women is more difficult to hear still.

2Cooper frames the problem as if the nation were conducting a trial. Commentators have served as attorneys for competing sides, she suggests, examining evidence and announcing conclusions, yet an important witness has not been called. A verdict reached without that testimony may be confident, but it cannot be complete.

3She does not claim that every outsider who misrepresents Black experience acts in bad faith. A person cannot always place herself fully within another person's circumstances. Yet that limitation, Cooper argues, makes first-person testimony more necessary, not less. If Americans believe that a fair judgment depends on hearing relevant evidence, then a perspective formed within the conditions being judged must enter the record.

4Cooper therefore presents her book not as the final statement on a national problem but as evidence from a position too often omitted. The value of the voice lies partly in its location. A society that wants an accurate account of itself cannot keep speaking about people whose testimony it excludes.