How Long? How Long?: African American Women in the Struggle for Civil Rights / Edition 1

by Belinda Robnett

Overview

A compelling and readable narrative history, How Long? How Long? presents both a rethinking of social movement theory and a controversial thesis: that chroniclers have egregiously neglected the most important leaders of the Civil Rights movement, African-American women, in favor of higher-profile African-American men and white women. Author Belinda Robnett argues that the diversity of experiences of the African-American women organizers has been underemphasized in favor of monolithic treatments of their femaleness and blackness.

Drawing heavily on interviews with actual participants in the American Civil Rights movement, this work retells the movement as seen through the eyes and spoken through the voices of African-American women participants. It is the first book to provide an analysis of race, class, gender, and culture as substructures that shaped the organization and outcome of the movement. Robnett examines the differences among women participants in the movement and offers the first cohesive analysis of the gendered relations and interactions among its black activists, thus demonstrating that femaleness and blackness cannot be viewed as sufficient signifiers for movement experience and individual identity. Finally, this book makes a significant contribution to social movement theory by providing a crucial understanding of the continuity and complexity of social movements, clarifying the need for different layers of leadership that come to satisfy different movement needs.

An engaging narrative history as well as a major contribution to social movement and feminist theory, How Long? How Long? will appeal to students and scholars of social activism, women's studies, American history, and African-American studies, and to general readers interested in the perennially fascinating story of the American Civil Rights movement.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780195114911
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	01/13/2000
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	9.25(w) x 6.00(h) x 0.59(d)
Lexile:	1370L (what's this?)

About the Author

Belinda Robnett is Associate Professor of Sociology and Women's Studies at the University of California at Davis.

Table of Contents

	Introduction	3
1	Rethinking Social Movement Theory: Race, Class, Gender, and Culture	12
	Social Location and Identity	15
	Reconceptualizing Leadership	17
	Defining Bridge Leadership	19
	The Movement Sector: Centralized Power, Primary and Secondary Formal Organizations, and Bridge Organizations	23
	Social Movement Theories	26
	Bridge Leaders, Formal Leaders, and the State	26
	Charismatic Leadership and Emotion	28
	Social Movement Literature: Emotion and Spontaneity	32
	Conclusion	34
2	Exclusion, Empowerment, and Partnership: Race Gender Relations	36
	Black Women Activists Speak Out: Empowered, Not Oppressed	36
	Black Women in Support of Male Leadership	41
	A Glimpse into Black Women's Historic Activism	44
	Mary McLeod Bethune and the National Association of Colored Women	45
	Mary McLeod Bethune, the Roosevelt Administration, and A. Philip Randolph	46
	The Rise of Nonviolent Resistance	49
	Conclusion	51
3	Women and the Escalation of the Civil Rights Movement	53
	Early Resistance to Segregated Transportation	53
	The Women's Political Council of Montgomery	55
	The Formation of the Montgomery Improvement Association	62
	Conclusion	68
4	Sustaining the Momentum of the Movement	71
	Miss Ella Baker and the Origins of the SCLC	71
	The Movement Gains Momentum	76
	Conclusion	83
5	Sowing the Seeds of Mass Mobilization	86
	The Roots of Micromobilization	86
	Connecting Prefigurative Politics to Strategic Politics	90
	Bridge Leaders, Gender, and the SCLC	93
	Conclusion	96
6	Bridging Students to the Movement	98
	Community Bridge Leaders as Temporary Formal Leaders	103
	Community Bridge Leaders as Secondary Formal Leaders	107
	Women, Power, and Titled Positions	109
	Women Bridge Leaders and Their Heroines	111
	Conclusion	113
7	Race, Class, and Culture Matter	115
	Interpersonal Relationships in SNCC	118
	Race, Class, Gender, and Culture in SNCC	122
	Dispelling Sexual Myths	133
	Conclusion	137
8	Bringing the Movement Home to Small Cities and Rural Communities	140
	Local Women's Activism Despite Minister Opposition	140
	Indigenous Bridge Leaders: Links Between Community and Organization	143
	Women and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party	150
	Economic and Physical Reprisals	153
	Conclusion	156
9	Cooperation and Conflict in the Civil Rights Movement	157
	Women as Primary Formal Leaders	157
	Fannie Lou Hamer and the MFDP	157

Editorial Reviews

"Bound to be controversial, Robnett's How Long? How Long? challenges received perspectives on the role of gender in the Civil Rights Movement. In doing so she has made a major contribution to our understanding of the internal dynamics of social movements. It is both impassioned and impressive."—Mayer Zald, Department of Sociology, University of Arizona

"This book rewrites the history of the Civil Rights movement from the standpoint of African American women. Conceptually, this project joins a recent wave of scholarship in social movements that is beginning to address the intersections of race, class, gender and social movements. Substantively, this book contributes a beautiful overview of black women's long history of resistance to race and gender oppression in the United States...No one has ever undertaken such an ambitious project with respect to black women's activism."—Verta Taylor, Ohio State University

"Belinda Robnett has made a unique contribution to our understanding of the Civil Rights movement and social movements generally. How Long? How Long? clearly demonstrates that gender mattered in the Civil Rights movement and that gender must be taken into account if we are to formulate accurate and comprehensive theories of collective action. This work is based on extensive research which gives voice to the masses of women who played pivotal roles in the Civil Rights movement. Finally, a work has appeared that captures the monumental contributions women made to the Civil Rights movement. "After reading Belinda Robnett's book, one comes to understand clearly that if it were not for the actions of Black women, there would not have been a Civil Rights movement."—Aldon D. Morris, Northwestern University

"Professor Belinda Robnett's book, How Long? How Long?, makes a valuable contribution to the field by providing a workable analytical framework for those scholars studying African American women in the movement."—The Journal of American History

From the Publisher