James Baldwin (1924-1987)
James Baldwin’s enduring mid-twentieth-century book, The Fire Next Time (1963), was originally published as two separate essays. The shorter piece, titled “My Dungeon Shook — Letter to My Nephew on the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Emancipation,” appeared in The Progressive in December 1962, and the long essay “Down At The Cross — Letter from a Region of My Mind” was published in The New Yorker a month earlier.
(Interesting connection: At the end of her interview with The Normal School literary magazine, Patricia Smith says she would most want to see her book of poems, Incendiary Art, in conversation with Baldwin’s “Letter to My Nephew.”)
Read James Baldwin’s “A Letter to My Nephew” (originally published in The Progressive, December 1, 1962)
Read James Baldwin’s “Letter from a Region in My Mind” (originally published in The New Yorker, November 9, 1962)
I Am Not Your Negro (2016)
Written by James Baldwin and Directed by Raoul Peck
Watch the film at home through Amazon, iTunes, or Google Play
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968)
Martin Luther King, Jr. “I Have a Dream,” Address Delivered at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, August 28, 1963
Read full speech here: https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/king-papers/documents/i-have-dream-address-delivered-march-washington-jobs-and-freedom
and explore: The Martin Luther King, Jr.Research and Education Institute
Ruth Wilson Gilmore
Listen to the both parts of the podcast: “Ruth Wilson Gilmore Makes the Case for Abolition” on “The Intercept”: https://theintercept.com/2020/06/10/ruth-wilson-gilmore-makes-the-case-for-abolition/
Sojourner Truth (1797-1883)
“On Woman’s Rights” (1851)/ “Ain’t I a Woman” (1863)
EXPLORE: Sojourner Truth at equalityarchive.com
Audre Lorde (1934-1992)
A self-described “black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet,” Audre Lorde was born in Harlem, NY. She attended Hunter College High School and Hunter College, and she would eventually teach at CUNY’s Lehman College, at John Jay College of Criminal Justice (teaching black studies), and Hunter College. She lived on Staten Island from 1972-87.
“The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.”
Kai Davis (website)
“Ain’t I a Woman,” March 26, 2016
