The Challenge of Blackness
The Institute of the Black World and Political Activism in the 1970s
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5704968 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Tracy E K’meyer (University of Louisville, corresponding author), T E K'Meyer |
| Year | 2012 |
| Volume | 99 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 997-998 |
| Publication date | 2012-12-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of American History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-8723 • E-ISSN: 1945-2314 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jahist/jas452 |
| OpenAlex | W2094168338 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
Activists at the time and historians since have asked, What was the direction for the black freedom struggle in the wake of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination? In The Challenge of Blackness Derrick E. White uses the Institute of the Black World (ibw) as a lens to view how black intellectuals sought to bring together the divergent ideals of the period and forge practical solutions to ongoing problems of structural racism. This organizational study contributes to scholarship on the long civil rights movement, or, as White puts it, the “long 1970s,” but flaws in presentation limit the book's overall effectiveness. White sets his story in the context of both ideological divisions among African Americans and radical groups' struggle with political harassment. He focuses on the ibw's role in fostering black studies programs, its contribution to the effort to unite African Americans around a common political agenda at the 1972 Gary Convention, and its members' dissemination of research reports and other publications. In addition, the author uses two moments in the ibw's history to highlight key themes: its break with the King Center in 1970 illustrates the division between civil rights liberals and black liberation radicals, and a series of break-ins and other harassment suffered by the ibw in 1975 show how political terrorism silenced activist organizations
Black Power · Context (archaeology · Harassment · Ideology · Political science · Politics · Racism · Scholarship · Sociology · White (mutation · Gender Studies · History · Law · Race, History, and American Society
| Citations per year | 0.45 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2015 - 2022 (8) |
| Highly cited | No |