AFAM Unit 4.4-4.8 Quiz Prep

Describe the NAACP

• The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

• Formed 1909

• Interracial organization

• Fought discrimination with legal campaigns

• WEB Du Bois & Ida B. Wells among founders

• Rosa Parks (NAACP Secretary) help launch Montgomery Bus Boycott

Describe the National Urban League

• Founded NYC 1910

• Interracial organization

• Assisted AFAM migrating from rural South during Great Migration

• Support March on Washington

• Work with SCLC

Describe the Congress of Racial Equality

• CORE

• Founded by black & white chicago students 1942

• Organize sit-ins with other organizations

• Organize voter registration driver

• Organize Freedom Rides 1961

Describe the SCLC

• Southern Christian Leadership Conference

• Established 1957

• First president MLK

• Coordinate action of churches and organizatins to launch protests

  • Selma Voting Rights March 1965

Describe SNCC

• the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee

• Founded 1960

• Ella Baker assisted students interested in SCLC’s in founding their own organization

• Staged Greenboro sit-ins

List the “Big Six”

1. MLK (SCLC)

2. James Farmer (CORE)

3. John Lewis (SNCC)

4. Roy Wilkins (NAACP)

5. A. Phillip Randolph (Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters)

6. Whitney Young (the National Urban League)

List Nonviolent resistance strategies

• Marches

• Sit-ins

• Litigation

• Forms of nonviolent disobidience

• Mass media

What happened after assassination of MLK

• Members of CORE and SNCC lost faith in effectiveness of nonviolence

• Transition to separatists black nationalists principles

LO: Describe coalitions that developed between African Americans, Whites, and other groups to advance civil rights.

• Freedom Rides

• March on Washington

Describe the Freedom Rides

• Black and White Freedom Riders traveled on interstate buses to challenge segregated transportation in the U.S. South

• Violence used against the Freedom Riders to enforce segregation generated national attention

Describe the March on Washington

• 1963

• Organized by:

  • Bayard Rustin

  • The “Big Six”

  • Four White leaders from religious and social organizations

• Massive peaceful protest that drew over 250,000 participants

• MLK delivered “I Have a Dream” (called for end of discrimination and racism)

Describe Bayard Rustin

• Advisor for MLK & face discrimination for being gay

  • Helped organize Montgomery Bus Boycott

Describe Pauli Murray

• Denied admission to Harvard Law for being a woman

• Developed guidelines for desegragation used during Brown v. Board of Education

LO: Explain how civil rights activism in the mid-20th century led to federal and legislative achievements.

• Civil Rights Act of 1964: Ended segregation and prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, color, and religion

• The Voting rights Act of 1965: Outlawed discriminatory barriers in voting

LO: Describe the ways Black women leaders furthered the goals of the major civil rights organizations.

 Leaders such as Ella Baker and Fannie Lou Hamer stressed the importance of addressing both racial and gender discrimination during the Black Freedom movement.

Describe Ella Baker

• “Mother of the Civil Rights Movement”

• Major impact on 

  • NCAA

  • SCLC

  • SNCC

• Encourage young people to contribute to social justice efforts to fight racism & sexism

• 1960 speech at SNCC founding emphasize need for group-centered leadership

• Argued lunchcounter sit-ins demonstrate need for AFAM inclusion in all aspects of life

Describe Dorothy Height

• Led National Council of Negro women for 40 years

• Worked with “Big Six” on March on Washington

LO: Explain how artists, performers, poets, and musicians of African descent advocated for racial equality and brought international attention to the Black Freedom movement.

• Black artists work brought AFAM resistance to inequality to global audiences

• Strengthened efforts by Afro-descendants outside US.

Describe Josephine Baker

• Internationally known performer and civil rights activist

• Critiqued the double standards of an American democracy that maintained segregation while promoting ideals of equality domestically and abroad

Describe Nicolás Guillén

• Prominent negrismo Cuban poet of African descent,

• Examined the connections between anti-Black racism in the US and Latin America

  • Denounced segregation

  • Brought Black Freedom struggles to the attention of audiences beyond the US

Describe Charles Mingus

• Jazz bassist

• composed protest songs reliant on AFAM musical traditions (like call and response)

• music drew global attention to the white supremacist responses to racial integration in the U.S. (e.g., the Little Rock Crisis, 1957).

LO: Explain how faith and music inspired African Americans to combat continued discrimination during the civil rights movement.

Faith and music important elements of inspiration and community mobilization during the civil rights movement 1950s-1960s

• Many risked their lives for equality and freedom

• Songs unified activists’ spirits

• Gave direction through lyrics

• Communicated their hopes for a more just and inclusive future

Freedom songs emerged through the adaptation of…

• Hymns

• Spirituals

• Gospel songs

• Labor union songs in Black churches (which had created space for organizing broad range of musical genres)

What did MLK say about freedom songs

• Martin Luther King Jr. described “We Shall Overcome” as an anthem of the civil rights movement

  • Activists often sang the song while 

    • Marching

    • Protesting

    • When they were arrested

    • While in jail

• Anthem served as a muse for King’s 1966 speech of the same name

LO: Describe examples of diasporic solidarity that emerged between African Americans and Africans in the 20th century.

1950s-1960s AFAM writers, leaders, and activists visit Africa to express solidarity and support for Africa’s decolonization

• Some embraced pan-Africanism 

• Advocated for the political and cultural unity of all people of African descent

What did The Republic of Ghana’s independence from British colonial rule in 1957 inspire

• Inspired visits from AFAM activists

  • Martin Luther King Jr. 

  • Malcolm X

  • Maya Angelou (writer)

  • Pauli Murray (lawyer) 

  • W.E.B. Du Bois. (historian, sociologist)

LO: Explain the impact of diasporic solidarity between African Americans and Africans in the 20th and 21st centuries.

• Solidarity between Africans and AFAM brought international attention to Africa’s decolonization

• Diasporic solidarity bolstered the global reach of the Black Freedom movement

  • Period of activism from the mid-1940s to  1970s

    • Marked by both the civil rights movement (which annulled Jim Crow laws and practices) 

    • The Black Power movement,(which heightened Black consciousness and pride)

• Diasporic solidarity continues to the present day

  • 2019, Ghana’s government celebrated the Year of Return

    • An initiative to reunite African descendants in the diaspora to the continent

What was the “Year of Africa”

1960 17 African nations declared their independence from European colonialism