This note pack includes in-depth and detailed notes on Black Power covered in the Grade 12 IEB History syllabus. Everything you need for your exams or tests! These notes have been written by two History students who received A's from these study notes. These notes are SAGS compliant & have enabled ...
Black Power
The emergence of black power
- The Civil Rights Movement focused on ending segregation in the South
- Northern states ® still discrimination
- By 1965, many African Americans lived there ® poor housing, schools & high unemployment
- Many were descendants of African Americans who moved from the rural southern states in the late 19th
century & early 20th centuries
- They had escaped the harsh segregation laws of the south, but the North didn’t give them the same
opportunity as whites
- As the 1960s progressed, they came to reject the non-violent methods which MLK Jr & the SCLC
advocated
- By 1965, the leading civil rights group began to drift apart
- New leaders emerged as the movement turned to the North, where African Americans faced racial
prejudice despite desegregation
- Impatient at the slow rate of change, they adopted more radical tactics of ‘Black Power’ Movement
- The growth of the movement coincided with a wave of riots in American cities in mid 1960s
- Main causes of riots ® poor living conditions & police brutality in the ghettos
- The problem facing African Americans in the North ® de facto segregation
De facto Segregation:
- Segregation that exists by practice and tradition
- Can be harder to fight than de jure segregation ® eliminating it requires changing people’s attitudes
- Activists would find it more difficult to convince whites to share economic & social power with African
Americans than to convince them to share lunch counters & bus seats
- De facto segregation intensified after African Americans migrated to Northern cities during and after
WWII
- This began a ‘white flight’ in which great numbers of whites moved out of the cities to the nearby suburbs
- Most urban African Americans lived in slums, paying rent to landlords who didn’t comply with housing
and health requirements
- The schools for African American children deteriorated along with their neighbourhoods
- Unemployment rates were twice as a high as those among whites
- Whites did not understand African Americans’ anger after south was desegregated
- Some realised that African Americans wanted and needed economic equality of opportunity in jobs,
housing & education
, Black Power Movement:
- Philosophy & grassroots movement (from children upwards) rather than a political organisation
- During the Meredith March against Fear in Mississippi, SNCC Chairman, Stokely Carmichael called
marchers by chanting “We want Black Power”
- Rejected the term ‘Negro’ ® referred to themselves as ‘black’ instead
- Emphasised the importance of racial pride, self-sufficiency & equality for all people of Black and African
descent
- Supporters of Black Power believed that MLK Jr did not go far enough to protect & promote black
interests
AIMS:
- To promote black pride in black culture, traditions & history
- To promote a distinct black identity ® used the slogan ‘Black is Beautiful’
- Urged solidarity with Africa
- Supported black political and cultural institutions rather than seeking equality & acceptance by whites
STOKELY CARMICHAEL:
- Born in Trinidad but went to high school & university in the US
- 1961 ® Joined the Students Non-violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) & was involved in the CRM as a
Freedom Rider (Freedom Summer Project)
- 1966 ® became leader of the SNCC
- June 1966 ® James Meredith (first black student to enrol at the University of Mississippi) shot by a sniper
while walking alone in a ‘March against Fear’ from Memphis to Jackson, to protest against racism
- Carmichael, MLK Jr & others continued the march to honour Meredith
- Meredith re-joined the march after recovering in hospital
- During the march, Carmichael and other were arrested
(27th time he’d been arrested for taking part in Civil Rights protests)
- After he was released from jail, he made a famous speech using the term ‘Black Power’ for the first time
- He called on African Americans to ‘unite, to recognise their heritage, and to build a sense of community’
and to form & lead their own organisations
- NAACP & SCLC rejected some of Carmichael’s ideas and accused him of black racism
- Adopted the slogan ‘Black is Beautiful’ ® promoting black pride and rejected white notions of style
(followers wore Afro hairstyles and African-style clothing)
- Became increasingly critical of other leaders (MLK Jr) & their willingness to work with whites
- Later left the SNCC & joined the Black Panther Party, becoming its ‘honorary prime minister’
- When Carmichael spoke out against US involvement in the Vietnam War, the US gov. confiscated his
passport for 10 months
- After he moved to Guinea in West Africa, he wrote a book likening Black Power to Pan-Africanism
- Died in 1998
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