Black Prophetic Fire

Black Prophetic Fire

An unflinching look at nineteenth- and twentieth-century African American leaders and their visionary legacies.

In an accessible, conversational format, Cornel West, with distinguished scholar Christa Buschendorf, provides a fresh perspective on six revolutionary African American leaders: Frederick Douglass, W. E. B. Du Bois, Martin Luther King Jr., Ella Baker, Malcolm X, and Ida B. Wells. In dialogue with Buschendorf, West examines the impact of these men and women on their own eras and across the decades. He not only rediscovers the integrity and commitment within these passionate advocates but also their fault lines.
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West, in these illuminating conversations with the German scholar and thinker Christa Buschendorf, describes Douglass as a complex man who is both â€œthe towering Black freedom fighter of the nineteenth centuryâ€ and a product of his time who lost sight of the fight for civil rights after the emancipation. He calls Du Bois â€œundeniably the most important Black intellectual of the twentieth centuryâ€ and explores the more radical aspects of his thinking in order to understand his uncompromising critique of the United States, which has been omitted from the American collective memory. West argues that our selective memory has sanitized and even â€œSantaclausifiedâ€ Martin Luther King Jr., rendering him less radical, and has marginalized Ella Baker, who embodies the grassroots organizing of the civil rights movement. The controversial Malcolm X, who is often seen as a proponent of reverse racism, hatred, and violence, has been demonized in a false opposition with King, while the appeal of his rhetoric and sincerity to students has been sidelined. Ida B. Wells, West argues, shares Malcolm Xâ€™s radical spirit and fearless speech, but has â€œoften become the victim of public amnesia.â€
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By providing new insights that humanize all of these well-known figures, in the engrossing dialogue with Buschendorf, and in his insightful introduction and powerful closing essay, Cornel West takes an important step in rekindling the Black prophetic fire so essential in the age of Obama.
Country USA
Brand Beacon Press
Manufacturer Beacon Press
Binding Paperback
ItemPartNumber Illustrated
Color Multicolor
ReleaseDate 2015-09-01
UnitCount 1
Format Illustrated
EANs 9780807018101

Country	USA
Brand	Beacon Press
Manufacturer	Beacon Press
Binding	Paperback
ItemPartNumber	Illustrated
Color	Multicolor
ReleaseDate	2015-09-01
UnitCount	1
Format	Illustrated
EANs	9780807018101

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