Integration, transformation and the redemption of America
The Fire Next Time and A Letter from Birmingham Jail
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12674705 |
|---|---|
| Authors | James Miller (0000-0003-1666-2343, King's College London, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2009 |
| Volume | 28 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 245-262 |
| Publication date | 2009-10-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | European Journal of American Culture (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1466-0407 • E-ISSN: 1758-9118 |
| Publisher | Intellect (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1386/ejac.28.3.245_1 |
| OpenAlex | W1991933591 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 4 |
This article compares James Baldwin's essay The Fire Next Time with Martin Luther King Jr.'s A Letter From Birmingham City Jail to argue for a greater recognition of Baldwin's contribution to Civil Rights discourse. The article uses close comparative reading to consider the rhetorical devices used to give the respective texts a greater sense of moral urgency. Both texts are shown to focus on the African-American family, showing how racial injustice is felt most acutely within this arena. The article compares and contrasts the different treatment of the church in both texts, arguing that while King evokes the radicalism of the early church to authorize his appeal to the white clergy, Baldwin breaks with the church altogether to stress love as the means of enabling recognitions between the races. Finally, the article compares and analyses Baldwin's transformative, radical conception of love alongside King's agape to show how Baldwin's emphasis on individual experiences broadens the ambit of Civil Rights discourse
Appeal · Art · Civil rights · Commercialism · Injustice · Literature · Political radicalism · Political science · Politics · Rhetorical question · Sociology · Transformative learning · White (mutation · American Constitutional Law and Politics · American Political and Social Dynamics · Gender Studies · Law · Philosophy · Race, History, and American Society · Religious studies
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |