We ain't what we ought to be
Subtitle: the Black freedom struggle, from emancipation to Obama
By: Stephen Tuck
Publisher: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Published: 2010
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 494
ISBN-13: 9780674036260
Description: In this book the author traces the black freedom struggle in all its diversity, from the first years of freedom during the Civil War to President Obama's inauguration. As it moves from popular culture to high politics, from the Deep South to New England, the West Coast, and abroad, he weaves stories of ordinary black people, as well as celebrated figures, into the sweep of racial protest and social change. The drama unfolds from an armed march of longshoremen in post Civil War Baltimore to Booker T. Washington's founding of Tuskegee Institute; from the race riots following Jack Johnson's "fight of the century" to Rosa Parks' refusal to move to the back of a Montgomery bus; and from the rise of hip hop to the journey of a black Louisiana grandmother to plead with the Tokyo directors of a multinational company to stop the dumping of toxic waste near her home. This work rejects the traditional narrative that identifies the Southern non-violent civil rights movement as the focal point of the black freedom struggle. Instead, it explores the dynamic relationships between those seeking new freedoms and those looking to preserve racial hierarchies, and between grassroots activists and national leaders. As the author shows, strategies were ultimately contingent on the power of activists to protest amidst shifting economic and political circumstances in the U.S. and abroad. This book captures an extraordinary journey that speaks to all Americans, both past and future.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [421]-477) and index.
Table of contents: title: The freedom war, 1861-1865; title: Freedom is not enough, 1865-1877; title: Resisting the juggernaut of White supremacy, 1878-1906; title: Black leaders reckon with Jim Crow, 1893-1916; title: Great War and Great Migration, 1917-1924; title: Renaissance in Harlem, dark ages elsewhere, 1924-1941; title: World War II and its aftermath, 1941-1948; title: Three steps forward, two steps back, 1949-1959; title: The Civil Rights movement, 1960-1965; title: Black power and grassroots protest, 1966-1978; title: Reagan, rap, and resistance, 1979-2000.