Reformer and Leaders
This reformer advocated self-reliance for African Americans, particularly economically. He actually advised against challenging discrimination and segregation in his time.
This is a negative term for the controversial belief within a minority group that acting in more respectful and “respectable” ways will give the marginalized group better outcomes when pushing for change.
What is "respectability politics"?
This set of policies began in the 1970s, giving harsher penalties for nonviolent drug offenses. It led to a dramatic increase in the prison population and disproportionately impacted African Americans.
What is the War on Drugs?
This was an outpouring of cultural creativity among African Americans in the 1920s, enabled by higher education, African Americans from many regions such as the Caribbean, and the migration to northern cities.
What is the Harlem Renaissance?
He was elected in 2008 as the first black president of the United States.
Who is Barack Obama?
This black sociologist and activist wrote the book The Souls of Black Folk, was an early member of the NAACP, and advocated higher education for African Americans, disagreeing sharply and often with Booker T. Washington.
Who is W. E. B. DuBois?
This Party took a radical approach toward black civil rights, advocating self-defense, self-reliance, and ending capitalism.
What is the Black Panther Party (or the Black Panthers)?
This was a strategy pursued by Richard Nixon to gain votes in the American South, using coded language to appeal to racist white voters and drum up fear of urban crime and racial integration.
What is the "Southern Strategy"?
This was the movement of African Americans to northern cities, "pulled" by open jobs during World War I and "pushed" by violence and discrimination in the South.
What is the Great Migration?
This movement formed in 2013, named after a frequently-used Twitter hashtag. There is now a broader movement, as well as an official organization, that protests and raises awareness for African American rights, with a special focus on reforming the criminal justice system.
What is Black Lives Matter?
This reformer advocated for the emigration of black people to Africa, saying they would not only escape oppression, they could create a great empire to rival and surpass those of Europe.
Who is Marcus Garvey?
This protest movement, which lasted over a year, was an early, hard-fought victory for the Civil Rights movement. It helped make Martin Luther King Jr. a recognizable national leader in the movement.
What is the Montgomery Bus Boycott?
This government program secretly, spied on, infiltrated, harassed, and in some cases killed members of groups labelled as "subversive" during the Cold War. This included radical groups such as the Black Panthers, but also civil rights leaders such as Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr.
What is COINTELPRO?
What is double consciousness?
This unarmed black teenager was killed by George Zimmerman in 2012.
Who is Trayvon Martin?
This reformer investigated racial hate crimes including Emmett Till's murder. He was killed by the KKK in 1963.
Who is Medgar Evers?
This legislation outlawed segregation in public and private services of all kinds and gave the national government authority to investigate and enforce civil rights cases.
What is the Civil Rights Act of 1964?
This type of segregation results from individual or informal prejudice (rather than laws or policies).
What is de facto segregation?
Early in his career, Malcolm X was a fervent advocate of this new religious movement that started in the 1930s. Later in his life, he converted to traditional Sunni Islam.
What is the Nation of Islam?
This black teen was murdered in Mississippi in 1955, and his killers were not convicted. The shocking case motivated many more to get involved in the cause of civil rights.
Who is Emmett Till?
This Democratic politician created the Rainbow Coalition in the 1980s, drawing together supporters of racial equality, women's rights, and labor rights.
Who is Jesse Jackson?
This Supreme Court case decided that "separate but equal" was inherently discriminatory, and it ruled that schools may no longer be segregated by race.
What is Brown v. Board of Education?
This term is used to describe the ways in which the system of law enforcement and prisons in the United States disproportionately impacts African Americans through racial profiling, plea bargains, and harsher sentences for crimes.
What is mass incarceration (carceral state)?
This movement, led by Jesse Jackson during his run for president in 1984, was comprised of African Americans, feminists, environmentalists, and unionists. It did not win the presidency, but succeeded in getting many more black people to register to vote and participate in politics.
What is the Rainbow Coalition?
The recent Supreme Court decision Louisiana v. Callais dramatically weakened this Section of the Voting Rights Act.
What is Section 2?