Marketing justice

The Christmas Boycott

Bibliographic Data

ID22124792
AuthorsKatherine Parkin (0000-0001-9016-230X, Monmouth University, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume6
Issue3
Pages162-196
Publication date2020-09-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistory of Retailing and Consumption (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2373-5171 • E-ISSN: 2373-518X
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/2373518x.2020.1778377
OpenAlexW3046113598
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited29

This article explores the tension over whether to boycott Christmas in 1963 to protest the murder of six children in Birmingham, Alabama. The Association of Artists for Freedom, formed in the aftermath of the murders, was led by John O. Killens, James Baldwin, Odetta, Louis Lomax, Ruby Dee, and Ossie Davis. They took a leadership role in condemning the murders and demanding a national response; they called for the first national no-spending Christmas Boycott. Instead of a more traditional quid-pro-quo boycott that sought to exact demands of a company or a community, this boycott sought to use financial angst to compel a reckoning with racial justice. The broad appeal of the Christmas boycott emerged out of a growing recognition of the economic power Blacks had acquired. The boycott was intended to force a larger conversation and shift in behavior. Beyond shining the light on discrimination and violence in the South, the creative leaders imagined those in the West, the Midwest, and the North also being forced to confront their own racism and the institutionalized ways that racism pervaded the nation

Appeal · Boycott · Criminology · Media studies · Political science · Politics · Racism · Sociology · Status quo · American History and Culture · American Political and Social Dynamics · Law · Race, History, and American Society