Black Intellectuals: Race and Responsibility in American LifeIn the volumes of literature on black history and thought too few books have focused on the black thinkers who have helped shape the course of American culture. Now, this landmark work reveals the complex and vital role of African American intellectuals in the United States. It is a rich history, beginning with the arrival of Africans as slaves, when medicine men and conjurers held ancient, powerful wisdom. Author William Banks discusses with absorbing insight prominent. figures ranging from such black pioneers as Alexander Crummell, Frederick Douglass, and Anna Cooper to intellectuals of the modern age such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Alain Locke, E. Franklin Frazier, and Toni Morrison. These and hundreds of other black scholars and artists - many of them interviewed for this volume - people an enlightened and imaginative landscape, fascinating in both its range and its diversity. Full in historical scope and cultural vision, Black Intellectuals also illuminates facets of American history such as African tribal traditions; American slavery; and black schools, churches, politics, and popular culture. It is a comprehensive and readable history of African American intellectuals.-- Book Jacket. |
Contents
Laying the Foundations | 3 |
Black Thinkers in a White Movement | 22 |
The Black Intellectual Infrastructure | 33 |
Slowly Making Their Mark | 48 |
Prosperity Change and More of the Same | 68 |
A Talented But Trapped Tenth | 92 |
Not a Lull Not a Storm | 118 |
Standing at the Crossroads | 144 |
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abolitionist academic activists African American Alain Locke Ameri became black Americans black artists black colleges black community black cultural black intellectuals black masses black scholars black students black studies black thinkers black women black writers born career century Chicago civil rights Claude McKay Colored Countee Cullen creative critics economic editor educated blacks Ellison ethnic faculty Frederick Douglass free blacks freedom graduate Harlem Renaissance Harold Cruse Harvard Henry Louis Gates high school Howard Hurston ideas individual institutions intellec Jewish Journal Langston Hughes liberal literary mainstream Malcolm X middle-class militant moral movement NAACP nationalist Negro northern novel organization Ph.D poet political professor programs published race racial racism Ralph Ellison received a B.A. role slavery slaves social society South southern Sowell talented taught teachers teaching Thurman tion tradition urban W. E. B. Du Bois Wallace Thurman Washington wrote York young