Black Power was a revolutionary movement that cropped up in the 1960s and 70s. It was a socio-political movement whose founders and supporters held strong believe in racial pride, racial and social equality and self-sufficiency for all the Americans of the African origin. Disappointments, from the civil rights groups, resulted in the Black Power Movement. They used the Black Panther Party as the essence of their movement. This party was founded by Huey P. Bobby Seale, Newton and many others who felt that passive resistance was not realistic and that for real change to take place they needed to justify their adoption of violent tactics to realize the objectives of Black justice. This Black power was more than just a political jingle; it introduced a great change largely on the Black Culture
Several personalities came out guns blazing championing for this Black Power Movement. Independent forward thinking ideologues such as Malcolm X and Robert F. Williams shaped the rise and early development of Black Power Movement. Under the umbrella of the Black Panther Party, their philosophies were extensively felt 1 . Malcolm X believed that blacks had to defend themselves violently in the face of a violent assault if necessary to achieve their freedom as blacks. Unlike Martin Luther King, whose ideology was passive resistance that many young blacks rejected, Malcolm X played a greater role in encouraging protests to be more assertive. He was later assassinated while speaking at the Audubon Ballroom in Washington Heights, New York. This movement encouraged other blacks to be more vocal. The likes of Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver went ahead to write a book, Soul on Ice, which became his bestselling book life history. Stokely Carmichael and Charles Hamilton also wrote another book, Black Power , which identified the movement. Other published works of protest include Black Fire by Amira Baraka. Apart from expressing their grievances through writing books, they also extended it through sports. For instance, in the year 1967, veteran boxer Muhammad Ali served as significant source of inspiration to the expansion and support for the Black Panther Party. His accomplishments in the ring were themselves a political act 2 . All these vocal leaders associated with the Black Power Movement had a motive which was to get better education for their people. Their people had poor access to quality education. They also wanted to establish the African American community as an economically self-sufficient community with black-owned establishments such as shops, cooperatives, bookstores, media and farms 3 .
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The Black Power Movement and its activities were enunciated through political, cultural, social and economic initiatives. These were recommended as well as expanded as an avenue for the expansion of black arts. Thte intiatives aslo supported the expansion of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), the Nation of Islam, the Republic of New Afrika, the Black Panther Party, the Young Lords Party and through other many organizations they were able to stir up millions of African American to form the broadest lobby group in the history of the African-American community. There was the organization of black student unions by high school, and college youth, University lecturers and other educators developed Black Studies programs, young ministers preached theology, political conscious inmates saluted Malcolm X, athletes mobilized protests against poverty and racism and other many groups galvanized their mission. The movement was also articulated through education and cultural studies. The Maryland born Maulana Karenga was influential here. After his family migrated to California, where he took up African studies and studied languages like Kiswahili. This was a result of the influence he got from the movement. He proposed African Americans study Swahili in the early development of US organization. 4
It is evident that the failures of the Civil Rights movement led to the rise of the Black Power where they advocated for violence to get what they needed since passive resistance and civil disobedience was not adequate. The movement realized several gains for African Americans, which build on what the civil rights movement had achieved.
References
Africana Age. “Rethinking the Black Power Movement.” Accessed on October 11, 2018. http://exhibitions.nypl.org/africanaage/essay-black-power.html
Hall, Simon. “The NAACP, Black Power, and the African American Freedom Struggle, 1966–1969.” The Historian , 69, no. 1(2007): 49-82. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6563.2007.00174.x
Internet Archive. “The Black Power Movement 1968-1980.” Last modified May 21, 2004. Accessed on October 11, 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20171206182151/https:/hoover.archives.gov/exhibits/africanamerican/blackpower/index.html
1 “The Black Power Movement 1968-1980.” Internet Archive. Last Modified May 21, 2004. Accessed on October 11, 2018. https://web.archive.org/web/20171206182151/https:/hoover.archives.gov/exhibits/africanamerican/blackpower/index.html
2 Internet Archive, “The Black Power Movement 1968-1980.”
3 Simon Hall, “The NAACP, Black Power, and the African American Freedom Struggle, 1966–1969.” The Historian , 69, no. 1 (2007): 49.
4 “Rethinking the Black Power Movement.” Africana Age. Accessed on October 11, 2018. http://exhibitions.nypl.org/africanaage/essay-black-power.html
