When most people think of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, they think of Martin Luther King Junior, the crowds, the 'I Have a Dream' speech, and all with good reason. Yet one of the chief organizers of the event, Bayard Rustin, remained carefully and pointedly out of the spotlight. Why? Why was a man who was so integral to the nonviolent resistance…
Read moreHe was an American civil rights activist, leader, Pan-Africanist, sociologist, educator, historian, writer, editor, poet, and scholar. William Edward Burghardt Du Bois, better known as W.E.B Du Bois, was all these things and more. He helped found both the Niagara Movement and the NAACP, was the first African American to receive a Ph. D from Harvard, served as chairman of the Peace Information Center, and…
Read moreEthnic Notions looks at the portrayal of African Americans in American pop culture in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This Emmy award-winning documentary takes viewers on a disturbing voyage through American history, tracing the evolution of the deeply rooted stereotypes that have fueled anti-Black prejudice. Ethnic Notions was directed by Marlon Riggs, who, in addition to being a filmmaker, was also a poet,…
Read moreBy Warren K. Leffler, U.S. News & World Report Magazine [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons "I am sick and tired of being sick and tired." - Fannie Lou Hamer Fannie Lou Hamer was a central figure in the African American civil rights movement. She was the founder of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) and later the National Women's Political Caucus. The courage she demonstrated in…
Read moreBy O'Halloran, Thomas J., photographer [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) may be most remembered for their organization of the Freedom Rides, a series of interracial protests against segregated bus seating in the late 1960s. Founded in 1942 by James Farmer, Bayard Rustin, Homer Jack, and George Houser in Chicago, IL, CORE was created to improve race relations and end…
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