We Have Never Been Woke charts the rise and contemporary influence of symbolic capitalists — elites whose wealth and social position are based on what they know, who they know, and how they’re known.

The book explores how symbolic capitalists leverage social justice discourse in the service of intra-elite struggles over power, status, resources and opportunity. It demonstrates how and why these struggles rarely benefit the genuinely marginalized and disadvantaged in society and are often carried out at their expense.

Those People will explore the causes and consequences of the growing social distance between the institutions, professionals and communities tied to the symbolic professions and the broader societies in which they are embedded.

The book will highlight how this distance increasingly interferes with the ability of scholars and journalists to understand “those people” who are growing apart from us — to include growing numbers of working class Americans, ethnic and religious minorities, and other stakeholders that symbolic capitalists often understand themselves to be champions of and advocates for.