Sisters in the Struggle: African American Women in the Civil Rights-Black Power Movement

by Bettye Collier-Thomas, V.P. Franklin

Overview

The rarely heard stories of the brave African American women at the forefront of the Civil Rights Movement.

 

Sisters in the Struggle tells the stories and documents the contributions of African American women to the most important social reform in the United States in the twentieth century. Only recently have historians and other researchers begun to recognize black women’s central role in the battle for racial and gender equality.

 

These essays describe the early ideological development of Ella Baker, who helped found the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in 1960; Fannie Lou Hamer’s use of personal anguish to mold her public persona; and Septima Clark’s creation of a network of “Citizenship Schools” to teach poor black southerners to read and write to help them register to vote. We learn of black women’s activism in the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, the Black Panther Party, and the Free Joan Little Movement in the 1970s. It also includes personal testimonies from women who made headlines with their courageous resistance to racism and sexism—Rosa Parks, Charlayne Hunter Gault, and Dorothy Height.

 

Sisters in the Struggle presents a detailed analysis of the multifaceted roles played by women in civil rights and Black Power organizations, as well as the major political parties at the local, state, and national levels, while documenting the formation of a distinct black feminist consciousness. It represents the coming of age of African American women’s history and presents new studies that point the way to future research and analysis.

 

Contributors: Bettye Collier-Thomas, Vicki Crawford, Cynthia Griggs Fleming, V. P. Franklin, Charlayne Hunter-Gault, Farah Jasmine Griffin, Duchess Harris, Sharon Harley, Dorothy I. Height, Chana Kai Lee, Tracye Matthews, Genna Rae McNeil, Rosa Parks, Barbara Ransby, Jacqueline A. Rouse, Elaine Moore Smith, and Linda Faye Williams

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780814772348
Publisher:	New York University Press
Publication date:	11/21/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	377
Sales rank:	82,734
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Bettye Collier-Thomas is Professor of History and Director of the Center for African-American History and Culture at Temple University. She is the author of Daughters of Thunder: Black Women Preachers and Their Sermons and co-author, with V.P. Franklin, of My Soul is a Witness: A Chronology of the Civil Rights Era, 1954-1965.
V.P. Franklin is Distinguished Professor of History at Drexel University. He is the author of several books, including Martin Luther King, Jr.: A Biography and Living Our Stories, Telling Our Truths: Autobiography and the Making of the African-American Intellectual Tradition.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments xi

Introduction: In the Whip of the Whirlwind 1

part i: Laying the Groundwork: African American Women and Civil Rights Before 1950 9

1 "Closed Doors": Mary McLeod Bethune on Civil Rights 11
Introduction by Elaine M. Smith Mary McLeod Bethune

2 For the Race in General and Black Women in Particular: The Civil Rights Activities of African American Women's Organizations, 1915-50 21
V. P. Franklin and Bettye Collier-Thomas

3 Behind-the-Scenes View of a Behind-the-Scenes Organizer: The Roots of Ella Baker's Political Passions 42
Barbara Ransby

part ii: Personal Narratives 59

4 "Tired of Giving In": The Launching of the Montgomery Bus Boycott 61
Rosa Parks

5 "Heirs to a Legacy of Struggle": Charlayne Hunter Integrates the University of Georgia 75
Charlayne Hunter Gault

6 "We Wanted the Voice of a Woman to Be Heard": Black Women and the 1963 March on Washington 83
Dorothy I. Height

part iii: Women, Leadership, and Civil Rights 93

7 "We Seek to Know . . . in Order to Speak the Truth": Nurturing the Seeds of Discontent-Septima P. Clark and Participatory Leadership 95
Jacqueline A. Rouse

8 African American Women in the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party 121
Vicki Crawford

9 Anger, Memory, and Personal Power: Fannie Lou Hamer and Civil Rights Leadership 139
Chana Kai Lee

part iv: From Civil Rights to Black Power: African American Women and Nationalism 171

10 "Chronicle of a Death Foretold": Gloria Richardson, the Cambridge Movement, and the Radical Black Activist Tradition 174
Sharon Harley

11 Black Women and Black Power: The Case of Ruby Doris Smith Robinson and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee 197
Cynthia Griggs Fleming

12 "Ironies of the Saint": Malcolm X, Black Women, and the Price of Protection 214
Farah Jasmine Griffin

13 "No One Ever Asks What a Man's Role in the Revolution Is": Gender Politics and Leadership in the Black Panther Party, 1966-71 230
Tracye A. Matthews

part v: Law, Feminism, and Politics 257

14 "Joanne Is You and Joanne Is Me": A Consideration of African American Women and the "Free Joan Little" Movement, 1974-75 259
Genna Rae McNeil

15 From the Kennedy Commission to the Combahee Collective: Black Feminist Organizing, 1960-80 280
Duchess Harris

16 The Civil Rights-Black Power Legacy: Black Women Elected Officials at the Local, State, and National Levels 306
Linda Faye Williams

Selected Bibliography 333

Permissions 343
Contributors 345
Index 349

All illustrations appear as a group following page 148.

What People are Saying About This

Robin D.G. Kelley

If Bettye Collier-Thomas and V.P. Franklin had only gathered together a distinguished group of scholars to document the role woman played in the black freedom movement, their contribution would be immense. But Sister's in the Struggle is more than an acknowledgement and celebration of black woman's activism. It is a major revision of history, revealing that black women were the critical thinkers, strategists, fighters, and dreamers of the movement. Black feminists developed a social vision expansive enough to emancipate us all. --Robin D.G. Kelley, author of Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class

From the Publisher

"Sisters in the Struggle is a powerful, inspirational and insightful book that takes the reader on a journey into the lives of some of the nation's most gifted and courageous African American women leaders, feminist organizers, and Black Power advocates. It was through the dint of their efforts that they helped shape and define what American society should become. These "sheroes" remind us that the prices they paid for freedom bequeathed a legacy of human dignity and opportunity that must be sustained by generations to follow."

-Joyce A. Ladner,author of Tomorrow's Tomorrow: The Black Woman

"If Bettye Collier-Thomas and V.P. Franklin had only gathered together a distinguished group of scholars to document the role woman played in the black freedom movement, their contribution would be immense. But Sisters in the Struggle is more than an acknowledgement and celebration of black woman's activism. It is a major revision of history, revealing that black women were the critical thinkers, strategists, fighters, and dreamers of the movement. Black feminists developed a social vision expansive enough to emancipate us all."

-Robin D.G. Kelley,author of Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class

"The quality of each individual essay makes Sisters in the Struggle stand out as an unusual anthology, one whose total sum is actually more than its parts."

-Journal of American History

Joyce A. Ladner

Sisters in the Struggle is a powerful, inspirational and insightful book that takes the reader on a journey into the lives of some of the nation's most gifted and courageous African American women leaders, feminist organizers, and Black Power advocates. It was through the dint of their efforts that they helped shape and define what American society should become. These "sheroes" remind us that the prices they paid for freedom bequeathed a legacy of human dignity and opportunity that must be sustained by generations to follow.-- Joyce A. Ladner, author of Tomorrow's Tomorrow: The Black Woman

Editorial Reviews

"Sisters in the Struggle is a powerful, inspirational and insightful book that takes the reader on a journey into the lives of some of the nation's most gifted and courageous African American women leaders, feminist organizers, and Black Power advocates. It was through the dint of their efforts that they helped shape and define what American society should become. These "sheroes" remind us that the prices they paid for freedom bequeathed a legacy of human dignity and opportunity that must be sustained by generations to follow."

Joyce A. Ladner

"If Bettye Collier-Thomas and V.P. Franklin had only gathered together a distinguished group of scholars to document the role woman played in the black freedom movement, their contribution would be immense. But Sisters in the Struggle is more than an acknowledgement and celebration of black woman's activism. It is a major revision of history, revealing that black women were the critical thinkers, strategists, fighters, and dreamers of the movement. Black feminists developed a social vision expansive enough to emancipate us all."

Robin D.G. Kelley

"The quality of each individual essay makes Sisters in the Struggle stand out as an unusual anthology, one whose total sum is actually more than its parts."

Journal of American History

”If Bettye Collier-Thomas and V.P. Franklin had only gathered together a distinguished group of scholars to document the role woman played in the black freedom movement, their contribution would be immense. But Sisters in the Struggle is more than an acknowledgement and celebration of black woman's activism. It is a major revision of history, revealing that black women were the critical thinkers, strategists, fighters, and dreamers of the movement. Black feminists developed a social vision expansive enough to emancipate us all."

-Robin D.G. Kelley,author of Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class

”The quality of each individual essay makes Sisters in the Struggle stand out as an unusual anthology, one whose total sum is actually more than its parts.”

- Journal of American History

" Sisters in the Struggle is a powerful, inspirational and insightful book that takes the reader on a journey into the lives of some of the nation's most gifted and courageous African American women leaders, feminist organizers, and Black Power advocates. It was through the dint of their efforts that they helped shape and define what American society should become. These "sheroes" remind us that the prices they paid for freedom bequeathed a legacy of human dignity and opportunity that must be sustained by generations to follow.”

-Joyce A. Ladner,author of Tomorrow's Tomorrow: The Black Woman

From the Publisher