Books for Teaching
about the Civil Rights Movement
There is a vast list of print
resources on the Civil Rights and related movements
for social justice, as is evident from the bibliographies
on the website. This is simply a sampling from that
wide collection. Many of these were recommended to
us by the advisors. We have also included books written
by our advisors, as indicated by *. Also see our audiovisual
and web resources.
We have organized our suggested readings into
the following categories:
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Many of these books can of course be excerpted
for classroom use, but they are primarily written
for an adult reading level. The few that are written
specifically for a younger audience are labeled accordingly
as ES and MS.
|
 Acuña,
Rodolfo. Occupied
America: A History of Chicanos. 6th ed. New
York: Longman, 2006.
Occupied America was the first textbook to be published
for the growing number of Chicano history courses developing
across the country and remains the bestseller.
|
| Adickes, Sandra. The Legacy of a Freedom School. Palgrave Macmillan, Nov 2005. In 1964, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee decided to establish Freedom Schools as part of its Freedom Summer campaign in Mississippi. With a curriculum developed by dedicated educators, SNCC workers, and an equally dedicated staff of teachers and student volunteers, the schools provided a learning experience and teaching style that revealed to students who had known only the "stay in your place" experience of segregated education what schools should, and could, be. The achievements of the students involved in Freedom Summer lifted the expectations of students who followed them and hastened the end of segregated schools in Mississippi. In Legacy of a Freedom School, Sandra E. Adickes recalls her experiences working with the SNCC, reminding us all of the powerful Freedom Summer. |
Armstrong,
Julie, Houston B. Roberson, and Rhonda Y. Williams,
eds.  Teaching
the American Civil Rights Movement: Freedom’s
Bittersweet Song. New York: Routledge, 2003.
This book offers perspectives on presenting the movement
in college courses. Including sample syllabi and detailed
descriptions from courses that prove effective, this
work will be useful for all instructors, both college
and upper level high school, for courses in history,
education, race, sociology, literature, and political
science. |
 Baraka,
Amiri. The
Fiction of Leroi Jones/Amiri Baraka. Chicago,
Ill.: Lawrence Hill Books, 2000. As a survey
of Baraka’s writings in prose, the book accurately
displays the full range of the wordsmith’s skills:
from his bold, groundbreaking efforts as an influential
member of the post-Beat Lower East Side art scene to
his controversial cultural nationalism and his Marxist
conversion…. This collection offers an excellent
alternative look at one of the legends of African-American
letters, frequently quite different than that revealed
in his two autobiographies. (Publishers Weekly) |
 Bennett,
Lerone. Before
the Mayflower. 7th ed. Chicago, Ill.: Johnson
Publishing Company, 2003. Traces black history
from its origins in western Africa, through the transatlantic
journey and slavery, the Reconstruction period, the
Jim Crow era, and the Civil Rights Movement, to life
in the 1990s. (Ingram) |
 Branch,
Taylor. Parting
the Waters, America in the King Years 1954-1963.
New York: Touchstone, 1988. Pulitzer Prize-winning
account of the Movement’s early years from Montgomery
bus boycott through the March on Washington. Also Pillar
of Fire, America in the King Years 1963-1965. Covers
the Movement in the North, Freedom Summer, Selma, and
the Voting Rights Act. |
 *Carson,
Clayborne. In
Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s.
Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995. This sympathetic yet even-handed book records for the
first time the complete story of SNCC’s evolution,
of its successes and its difficulties in the ongoing
struggle to end white repression…. Carson’s
history of SNCC goes behind the scene to determine why
the group’s ideological evolution was accompanied
by bitter power struggles within the organization. Using
interviews, transcripts of meetings, unpublished position
papers, and recently released FBI documents, he reveals
how a radical group is subject to enormous, often divisive
pressures as it fights the difficult battle for social
change. |
 Collier-Thomas,
Bettye and V.P. Franklin, eds. Sisters
in the Struggle: African-American Women in the Civil
Rights-Black Power Movement. New York: New
York University Press, 2001. 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. |
| Countryman, Matthew. Up South: Civil Rights and Black Power in Philadelphia. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005. Matthew Countryman’s award winning history tells the story of the modern civil rights movement and the transition to Black Power in the city of Philadelphia. His narrative of the Black community’s effort to win some degree of control over the education of Black children, culminating in the November 17th student demonstration and police riot at the Board of Education, is important history for anyone concerned with education in Philadelphia and poses questions that remain central to the struggle for quality, equal education in our city today. |
 Donato,
Rubén. The
Other Struggle for Equal Schools: Mexican Americans
during the Civil Rights Era. Albany: State
University of New York, 1997. Examining the
Mexican-American struggle for equal education during
the 1960s and 1970s in the Southwest in general and
in a California community in particular, Donato looks
at how Mexican-American parents confronted the relative
tranquility of school governance, how educators responded
to increasing numbers of Mexican Americans in schools,
how school officials viewed problems faced by Mexican-American
children, and why educators chose specific remedies.
Finally, he examines how federal, state, and local educational
policies corresponded with the desires of the Mexican-American
community. |
 DuBois,
W. E. B. The
Souls of Black Folk. Chicago, Ill.: Dover Publications,
1994 (1903). W. E. B. Du Bois (1868–1963)
eloquently affirms that it is beneath the dignity of
a human being to beg for those rights that belong inherently
to all mankind. He also charges that the strategy of
accommodation to white supremacy only serves to perpetuate
black oppression. |
 Fanon,
Frantz. The
Wretched of the Earth. Reissue edition. New
York: Grove Press, 1986. The Wretched of
the Earth is considered by many to be one of the
canonical books on the worldwide black liberation struggles
of the 1960s. Within a Marxist framework, Fanon draws
upon his horrific experiences working in Algeria during
its war of independence against France. He addresses
the role of violence in decolonization and the challenges
of political organization and the class collisions and
questions of cultural hegemony in the creation and maintenance
of a new country’s national consciousness….Still
rings true at the cusp of a new century. |
 *Forman,
James. The
Making of Black Revolutionaries. Seattle: University
of Washington Press, 1997 (1972). Forman details
his role as the leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee (SNCC), but in telling his story he is also
relating that of many other civil rights advocates and
indeed of the 1960s itself. |
 Franklin,
John Hope and Alfred A. Moss Jr. From
Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans.
8th ed. New York: Knopf, 2000. Since its original
publication in 1947, From Slavery to Freedom has stood as the definitive history of African Americans.
John Hope Franklin and Alfred A. Moss Jr. give us a
vividly detailed account of the journey of African Americans
from their origins in the civilizations of Africa, through
their years of slavery in the New World, to the successful
struggle for freedom and its aftermath in the West Indies,
Latin America, and the United States. |
 Friedham,
William. Freedom’s
Unfinished Revolution: An Inquiry into the Civil War
and Reconstruction (The American Social History Project).
New York: New Press, 1996. Freedom’s
Unfinished Revolution is an innovative attempt
to describe this pivotal period in American history
for high-school students. It examines the ways that “ordinary” people—men and women, white
and black, Northern and Southern—experienced and
shaped the major events of the era. It highlights the
vital role of African Americans, whose achievements
in this period are often overlooked, though they stood
at the center of the national debate. Filled with primary
historical documents, including letters, speeches, and
excerpts from novels and newspapers, Freedom’s
Unfinished Revolution offers students a firsthand look
at the war and its aftermath: the struggle to rebuild
the South and construct a new society. Photographs,
engravings, art, and political cartoons are included,
as well as pre-reading and discussion questions, critical
thinking exercises, timelines, and a glossary. (American
Social History Project) MS/HS |
 *Gonzalez,
Juan. Harvest
of Empire: A History of Latinos in America.
New York: Penguin USA, 2001. Spanning 500 years—from
the first New World colonies to our nation’s 19th-century
westward expansion, from the days of gunboat diplomacy
to the turn of the millennium—Harvest of Empire
features family portraits of real-life immigrants along
with sketches of the political events and social conditions
that compelled them to leave their homeland. It also
gives a fascinating look at how Latino pioneers have
transformed the cultural landscape of the United States. |
 *Gonzalez,
Juan. Roll
Down Your Window: Stories of a Forgotten America.
New York: Verso, 1996. A union activist himself
at the New York Daily News, Gonzalez knows the vital
dignity of labor, writing about struggling and suffering
workers in New York, Honduras, and Haiti. Along with
vignettes from New York and the Los Angeles riots, Gonzalez
tracks the Honduran victims of a tragic New York fire
and the underreported murder of Manuel de Dios Unanue,
a Spanish-language journalist whose probes of Colombia’s
Cali drug cartel cost him his life. (Publishers Weekly) |
 Harding,
Vincent. Hope
and History: Why We Must Share the Story of the Movement.
Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1990. Harding
speaks about teaching, learning, historicizing, and
hope. He calls for the creative use of the Black-led
Freedom Movement of the post-World War II era as an
educational tool. As Lerone Bennett Jr. explains in
the foreword, Harding “asks us to assume our history
not as spectacle but as a task, not as fate but as a
‘destiny that is still ours to create.’” |
 Harrison,
Hubert. A
Hubert Harrison Reader. Edited by Jeffrey B.
Perry. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press,
2001. With publication of this volume it will
be possible to trace the evolution of Harrison’s
thought for the first time ever. The appearance of Harrison’s
writings will most certainly not only fill a gap in
our understanding of black radical and nationalist writings
around the World War I period and beyond, but will also,
I suspect, change the way in which we tend to look at
black thought generally in this period. (Ernest Allen
Jr., W. E. B. DuBois Department of Afro-American Studies,
University of Massachusetts at Amherst) |
| Haskins, James. The
March on Washington. New York: HarperCollins,
1993. This historical study of the Civil Rights
Movement examines the planning, happenings, and ramifications
of the pivotal event, and profiles the leaders involved.
ES/MS |
 Jordan,
June. Some
of Us Did Not Die: New and Selected Essays of June Jordan.
New York: Basic Books, 2002. Some of Us
Did Not Die brings together a rich sampling of
the late poet June Jordan’s prose writings. The
essays in this collection, which include her last writings
and span the length of her extraordinary career, reveal
Jordan as an incisive analyst of the personal and public
costs of remaining committed to the ideal and practice
of democracy. Willing to venture into the most painful
contradictions of American culture and politics, Jordan
comes back with lyrical honesty, wit, and wide-ranging
intelligence in these accounts of her reckoning with
life as a teacher, poet, activist, and citizen. |
| Joseph, Peniel. Waiting ’Til the Midnight Hour: A Narritive History of Black Power in America. Henry Holt and Company, 2006. With the rallying cry of “Black Power!” in 1966, a group of black activists, including Stokely Carmichael and Huey P. Newton, turned their backs on Martin Luther King’s pacifism and, building on Malcolm X’s legacy, pioneered a radical new approach to the fight for equality. Waiting ’Til the Midnight Hour is a history of the Black Power movement, that storied group of men and women who would become American icons of the struggle for racial equality. |
 Kluger,
Richard. Simple
Justice: The History of Brown
v. Board of Education and Black America’s
Struggle for Equality. New York: Random House,
1977. A quarter of a century after it was first
published, Simple Justice remains the definitive
history of Brown. |
 Louie,
Steve and Glen Omatsu, eds. Asian
Americans: The Movement and the Moment. Los
Angeles: UCLA Press, 2001. Asian Americans:
The Movement and the Moment documents the rich,
little-known history of Asian-American social activism
during the years 1965-2001. This book examines the period
not only through personal accounts and historical analysis,
but through the visual record-utilizing historical pictorial
materials developed at UCLA’s Asian American Studies
Center on Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Filipino, and Vietnamese
Americans. |
 *Martínez,
Elizabeth. De
Colores Means All of Us: Latina Views for a Multi-Colored
Century. Foreword by Angela Y. Davis. Cambridge,
Mass.: South End Press, 1998. The unique Chicana
voice of Elizabeth Martinez arises from her more than
30 years in the movements for civil rights, women’s
liberation, and Latina/o empowerment. With sections
on women’s organizing, struggles for economic
justice, and the Latina/o youth movement, De Colores
Means All of Us will appeal to readers and activists
seeking to organize for the future and build new movements
for liberation. |
 Melendez,
Mickey. We
Took the Streets: Fighting for Latino Rights with the
Young Lords. New York: St. Martin’s Press,
2003. The Young Lords were one of the most
provocative and controversial organizations to arise
during the tumult of the late 1960s. Inspired by the
wave of protest movements sweeping the country, and
the world, as well as organizations like the Black Panthers,
the Brown Berets, and the American Indian Movement,
the Young Lords became the most respected and powerful
voice of Puerto Rican empowerment in the country….
Although they were active for only a brief period of
time, the legacy of the Young Lords—their urban
guerilla, media-savvy tactics, as well as their message
of popular power and liberation, civil rights, and ethnic
equity—is lasting. We Took the Streets is one man’s passionate and inspiring story of
the Puerto Rican struggle for equality, civil rights,
and independence. |
 Meltzer,
Milton. There
Comes a Time: The Struggle for Civil Rights.
New York: Random House, 2002. Historian, scholar,
and award-winning author Milton Meltzer outlines the
struggle of African Americans for “life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness,” starting with the
landing of the first slave ships on colonial shores.
How did over 300 years of slavery, segregation, and
Jim Crow laws come to an end in the Civil Rights Movement
of the 1960s? What was achieved, and what are the problems
still facing us today? ES/MS |
 Morrison,
Toni. Remember:
The Journey to School Integration. Boston,
Mass.: Houghton Mifflin, 2004. Toni Morrison
has collected a treasure chest of archival photographs
that depict the historical events surrounding school
desegregation. These unforgettable images serve as the
inspiration for Ms. Morrison’s text—a fictional
account of the dialogue and emotions of the children
who lived during the era of “separate but equal” schooling. Remember is a unique pictorial and
narrative journey that introduces children to a watershed
period in American history and its relevance to us today.
ES/MS |
 *Moses,
Robert P. and Charles E. Cobb, Jr. Radical
Equations, Civil Rights from Mississippi to the Algebra
Project. Boston, Mass.: Beacon Press, 2001.
The story of Bob Moses’ work in the Civil
Rights Movement, the founding of the Algebra Project,
and why math literacy is the contemporary equivalent
of voting rights in the fight for equal citizenship.
(Hardback edition is titled: Radical Equations:
Math Literacy, and Civil Rights.) |
 Orfield,
Gary, Susan E. Eaton, and The Harvard Project on School
Desegregation. Dismantling
Desegregation: The Quiet Reversal of Brown
v. Board of Education. New York: The New Press,
1997. Dismantling Desegregation explains
the consequences of resegregation and offers direction
for a more constructive route toward an equitable future.
By citing case studies of ten school districts across
the country, Orfield and Eaton uncover the demise of
what many feel have been the only legally enforceable
routes of access and opportunity for millions of school
children in America. (The New Press) |
 *Payne,
Charles. I’ve
Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition and
the Mississippi Freedom Struggle. Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1995. Not a
comprehensive history of the Civil Rights Movement in
Mississippi, this thoughtful study instead analyzes
the legacy of community organizing there…. Concentrating
on the delta city of Greenwood, Payne offers useful
profiles of local activists, showing that many came
from families with traditions of social involvement
or defiance. He also explores the disproportionate number
of female volunteers, the older black generation’s
complex interactions with whites and the decline of
organizing as the 1960s proceeded. And he notes that,
despite an ideology of unity, black activists lost the
capacity to work together. (Publishers Weekly) |
 Powell,
Kevin. Who’s
Gonna Take the Weight? Manhood, Race, and Power in America.
New York: Crown Publishing Group, 2003. In
three mind-jolting essays…Kevin Powell leads us
to the heart of the searing issues facing us today,
from manhood, violence, and gender oppression to celebrity
culture and hip-hop. Using compelling personal stories
as the connecting thread, he examines what this nation
has become since the monumental upheavals of the 1960s
and where it might be headed if we’re not careful.
(Random House) |
 Sanchez,
Sonia. Shake
Loose My Skin: New and Selected Poems. Boston,
Mass.: Beacon Press, 2000. Known as one of
the leaders of the Black Arts movement, Sanchez’s
work represents the underlying influence of African-American
history and emerges as a bold example of an experimental
and revolutionary poetic form. By imitating the language
of everyday speech, Sanchez solidifies the sound of
the black American voice and places it more firmly in
our literary canon. This retrospective of 30 years of
work leaves one in awe of the stretches of language
Sanchez has helped to legitimize throughout her career,
language that carries the struggles of poverty, abandonment,
racism, and drugs and offers a place of refuge and a
path to hope. (Library Journal) |
 Takaki,
Ron. A
Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America.
Reissue edition. New York: Back Bay Books, 1994.
Takaki traces the economic and political history of
Indians, African Americans, Mexicans, Japanese, Chinese,
Irish, and Jewish people in America, with considerable
attention given to instances and consequences of racism.
The narrative is laced with short quotations, cameos
of personal experiences, and excerpts from folk music
and literature. (School Library Journal) |
 UCLA/IDEA.
Brown
v. Board of Education: 1954-2004. Los Angeles:
UCLA/IDEA, 2004.
A booklet for K-12 classrooms and community
groups, which examines the legacy of Brown v Board
for Los Angeles. The booklet chronicles the national
battle for equal schooling up to and since the Brown
decision. It also highlights the history of school segregation
in California and the ongoing struggle for equal schooling
in greater Los Angeles. |
 *Williams,
Juan. Eyes
on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965.
New York: Penguin USA, 1988. An excellent,
highly readable account of black America’s struggle
for social and political equality, covering the civil
rights battle from the landmark Brown v. Board of
Education decision in 1954 to the Selma protest
marches and Voting Rights Act of 1965. Williams focuses
upon specific key events, providing a narrative overview
of each, interspersed with photographs and excerpts
from interviews and writings of the participants. He
gives a vivid portrait of the courage of individual
blacks and the violence they had to endure in their
struggle for desegregation and the right to vote in
the South. (Library Journal). |
 Woodson,
Carter. The
Mis-Education of the Negro. Lawrenceville,
N.J.: Africa World Press, 1990 (1933). Originally
released in 1933, The Mis-Education of the Negro continues
to resonate today, raising questions that readers are
still trying to answer. The impact of slavery on the
Black psyche is explored and questions are raised about
our education system, such as what and who African Americans
are educated for, the difference between education and
training, and which of these African Americans are receiving. |
 *Zinn,
Howard. The
People’s History of the United States.
New York: Harper Collins, 1995. Known for its
lively, clear prose as well as its scholarly research,
A People’s History of the United States is the only volume to tell America’s story from
the point of view of—and in the words of—America’s
women, factory workers, African Americans, Native Americans,
working poor, and immigrant laborers. Spans American
history from Christopher Columbus’s arrival to
an afterword on the Clinton presidency. |
|  *Zinn,
Howard. SNCC:
The New Abolitionists. Radical 60s Series,
Volume 1. Cambridge, Mass.: South End Press, 2002.
SNCC: The New Abolitionists influenced a generation
of activists struggling for civil rights and seeking
to learn from the successes and failures of those
who built the fantastically influential Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee. It is considered an indispensable
study of the organization, of the 1960s, and of the
process of social change.
|
 Beals,
Melba Patillo. Warriors
Don’t Cry: A Searing Memoir of the Battle to Integrate
Little Rock’s Central High. Reprint edition.
New York: Pocket Books, 1995. Beals, one of
the “Little Rock Nine”, writes movingly
of desegregating Little Rock’s Central High School
in 1957-58. The horrors the nine black students faced
are told in a teenager’s voice, simply and sadly.
Robbed of normal adolescence, Beals grew up fast….This
[is] a highly readable tale of courage in the face of
persecution that deserves to be read, especially by
young people. (School Library Journal) MS |
 Carmichael,
Stokely with Ekwueme Michael Thelwell. Ready
for Revolution: The Life and Struggles of Stokely Carmichael
(Kwame Ture). New York: Scribner, 2003.
Recounts the course of his own experience and struggles,
ranging from the prison farms and lynch mobs of Mississippi
through the firefights and political intrigue of the
African liberation wars to Black Power and Pan-Africanism.
His transformation from immigrant child to impassioned
activist is spellbinding. |
 Clark,
Septima and Cynthia Stokes Brown, eds. Ready
from Within: A First Person Narrative. Lawrenceville,
N.J.: Africa World Press, 1990. Septima Clark
played one of the most essential, but little recognized
roles in the Civil Rights Movement. Born in 1898 in
Charleston, South Carolina, she was a public school
teacher until 1956, when she was dismissed for refusing
to disavow her membership in the National Association
for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Subsequently,
she worked for the Highlander Folk School, helping to
set up Citizenship Schools throughout the South where
Black adults could learn to read and prepare to vote.
During the 1960s she worked with the Southern Christian
Leadership Conference and was a close associate of Martin
Luther King Jr. From 1978 to 1983 she served as the
first Black woman on the Charleston School Board. HS |
 Cleaver,
Eldridge. Soul
on Ice. New York: Dell Publishing, 1999 (1968). This autobiography, written by Black Panther Minister
of Information Cleaver while he was in California’s
Folsom State Prison, was one of the most popular and
influential books of the 1960s. |
|  Durr,
Virginia Foster. Outside
the Magic Circle: The Autobiography of Virginia Foster
Durr. Edited by Hollinger F. Barnard. Tuscaloosa:
University of Alabama Press, 1990. Virginia
Durr did not write the autobiography so aptly called ‘‘Outside the Magic Circle.’’ She spoke it, over the course of two years, in a series
of interviews for such invaluable collections as those
of the oral history programs at Columbia University
and the University of North Carolina. (New York
Times Book Review).
|
 Fosl,
Catherine. Subversive
Southerner: Anne Braden and the Struggle for Racial
Justice in the Cold War South. New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2002. Anne McCarty Braden is a southern
white woman who in the 1940s broke from her segregationist
and privileged past and became a lifelong crusader who
sought to awaken the consciences of white southerners
to the reality of racial injustice. Branded a communist
and seditionist by southern politicians who used McCarthyism
to prop up segregation as it crumbled, Braden nevertheless
became a role model to students who launched the 1960s
sit-ins, and to successive generations of peace and
justice activists. Braden’s story connects southern
reform drives of the 1930s and 1940s to the mass civil
rights movement of the 1960s and to the continuation
of racial justice campaigns today. The book reveals
how the Cold War directly impacted the Civil Rights
Movement. |
 Haskins,
James. Bayard
Rustin: Behind the Scenes of the Civil Rights Movement.
New York: Hyperion Press, 1997. Haskins adeptly
seeks out the forces that shaped Rustin’s beliefs—among
them, his grandmother who raised him as a Quaker—and
describes the evolution of Rustin’s political
activism. Sensitive to hatred of all kinds, Rustin
remained dedicated to nonviolence throughout his life,
spending years in prison for refusing to fight in
World War II and eventually teaching Gandhi’s
principles of nonviolence as a protest tactic to Martin
Luther King Jr. The leader’s crowning achievement
was organizing the 1963 March on Washington. Haskins
not only gives enough personal information to flesh
out his subject (Rustin was a talented musician and
skilled collector) but also presents each historical
event with nuance, fairness, and clarity. (Booklist)
HS
|
 Height,
Dorothy. Open
Wide the Freedom Gates: A Memoir. New York:
PublicAffairs, 2003. This book is a personal
memoir of a major figure in the Civil Rights Movement.
A contemporary of Dr. King, W. E. B. DuBois, Marcus
Garvey, Eleanor Roosevelt, Mary McLeod Bethune, Adam
Clayton Powell Sr., Langston Hughes, and often the
only woman involved in the Movement at the highest
leadership level.
|
 Kohl,
Herb and Judith. The
Long Haul: An Autobiography of Myles Horton.
New York: Teachers College Press, 2003. Myles
Horton founded the Highlander Folk School, which played
a key role in the labor movement of the 1930s and
the Civil Rights Movement. This book describes not
only his life and work, but also his philosophy of
education that could be applied to schools today.
|
 Lester,
Joan Steinau. Fire
in My Soul. New York: ATRIA Books, 2003.
The biography of Eleanor Holmes Norton, civil rights
activist who continues her struggle for social justice
as the outspoken (although nonvoting) congressional
representative for Washington, D.C. |
|  Lewis,
John and Michael D’Orso. Walking
with the Wind. New York: Simon & Schuster,
1998. The son of an Alabama sharecropper,
chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
(SNCC), and now a sixth-term United States congressman,
John Lewis has led an extraordinary life. Arrested
more than 40 times and severely beaten on several
occasions, he was one of the youngest yet most courageous
leaders of the Civil Rights Movement. Walking
with the Wind offers rare insight into the movement
and the personalities of all the civil rights leaders—what
was happening behind the scenes, the infighting, struggles,
and triumphs. Lewis takes us from the Nashville lunch
counter sit-ins to the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma,
Alabama, where he led more than 500 marchers on what
became known as “Bloody Sunday.” (Los
Angeles Times)
|
 Mills,
Kay. This
Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer.
New York: E. P. Dutton, 1994. Journalist
Mills has written a moving, inspiring biography of
Fannie Lou Hamer. The daughter and wife of poor Mississippi
sharecroppers, Hamer was in the forefront of major
struggles in Mississippi involving voter registration
and economic and educational rights for its black
citizens. To Mills, Hamer’s ability to influence
people came from a combination of energy, powerful
public speaking, and an extraordinary talent in music
and singing. (Library Journal) MS/HS
|
 Moody,
Anne. Coming
of Age in Mississippi. Reissue edition. New
York: Dell Publishing, 1997. A classic account
of growing up in 1940s Mississippi and Anne Moody’s
subsequent involvement in the Civil Rights Movement.
She is one of the original protestors at the Woolworth’s
counter in Jackson; after college she helped lead
a voter registration drive in rural Canton, Mississippi.
She describes finding her own name on a Klan “wanted” list and seeing a boy beaten as FBI agents watch from
across the street. She knows she can no longer return
safely to her hometown and feels estranged from family
members who do not share her passionate commitment
to fight racism. She is easy on no one, not even Martin
Luther King, whose nonviolent stance she eventually
questions. (review by Erica Bauermeister.) HS
|
|  Ransby,
Barbara. Ella
Baker and the Black Freedom Movement: A Radical Democratic
Vision. Chapel Hill: North Carolina Press,
2003. Ransby chronicles Baker’s long
and rich political career as an organizer, intellectual,
and teacher, from her early experiences in depression-era
Harlem to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and
1960s. Ransby shows Baker to be a complex figure whose
radical, democratic worldview, commitment to empowering
the black poor, and emphasis on group-centered, grassroots
leadership set her apart from most of her political
contemporaries.
|
|  Robinson,
Jo Ann Gibson. The
Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women Who Started It.
Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1990. Memoir of the bus boycott by one of its leaders who
headed the Women’s Political Council of Montgomery.
|
 Rosengarten,
Theodore. All
God’s Dangers: The Life of Nate Shaw.
Chicago, Ill.: University of Chicago Press, 1974.
The story of the 1930s, the Alabama Sharecroppers Union
as told by 84-year-old Nate Shaw. |
 Shakur,
Tupac. The
Rose That Grew from Concrete. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1999. Here now, newly discovered,
are Tupac’s most honest and intimate thoughts
conveyed through the pure art of poetry—a mirror
into his enigmatic life and its many contradictions….
Written in his own hand at the age of 19, they embrace
his spirit, his energy, ...and his ultimate message
of hope.
|
 Soto,
Gary. Jessie
De La Cruz: A Profile of a United Farm Worker.
New York: Persea Books, 2000. This is the
remarkable story of the UFW’s first woman organizer,
eloquently written for young adults…. In this
clear and moving narrative, enhanced by photographs
of the period, Jessie De La Cruz comes to life. Her
feelings and experiences are captured against a background
of the Depression and the Civil Rights and labor movements.
ES/MS
|
 Wells,
Ida B. and Alfreda Duster, eds. Crusade
for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991.
Ida B. Wells (1862-1931) was one of the foremost crusaders
against black oppression. This engaging memoir tells
of her private life as mother of a growing family
as well as her public activities as teacher, lecturer,
and journalist in her fight against attitudes and
laws oppressing blacks.
|
 *Williams,
Juan. Thurgood
Marshall: American Revolutionary. New York:
Three Rivers Press, 2000 (1998). This 1998
New York Times Notable Book of the Year is the definitive
biography of the great lawyer and Supreme Court justice
Thurgood Marshall.
|
|  X,
Malcolm and Alex Haley. The
Autobiography of Malcolm X. Reissue edition.
New York: Ballantine Books, 1992. The Autobiography
of Malcolm X is the result of a unique collaboration
between Alex Haley and Malcolm X, whose voice and
philosophy resonate from every page, just as his experience
and his intelligence continue to speak to millions
on the greatest issue of our day: the ongoing African-American
struggle for social and economic equality.
|
|
 Bass,
Patrick Henry. Like
a Mighty Stream: The March on Washington. Philadelphia,
Penn.: Running Press, 2002. Eyewitness accounts,
photographs, reporting, and observations provide a “people’s
history of the March on Washington.” MS/HS |
 Bolden,
Tonya. Tell
All the Children Our Story: Memories and Mementos of
Being Young and Black in America. New York:
Harry N. Abrams, Inc, 2001. In a warm, personal
voice, Tonya Bolden explores what it has meant to be
young and black in America. From the first recorded
birth of a black child in Jamestown, through the Revolution,
the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the fight for civil
rights, right on up to our own time, Bolden brings to
light how black children have worked and played, suffered
and rejoiced. She covers a range of lifestyles, social
classes, attitudes, and perceptions to portray children
in ever-evolving states of life. Both unknown and celebrated
children are included, from those remembered only from
advertisements for the slave trade to those who would
grow up to shape and make history, including Frederick
Douglass, Benjamin Banneker, Sadie and Bessie Delany,
Charles Johnson, and basketball legends Paula and Pamela
McGee. This important book, the first trade book of
its kind, draws on a wealth of primary sources, including
interviews, diaries, news articles, and historical documents,
and is generously illustrated with paintings, photographs,
posters, and other ephemera. ES/MS |
 Bond,
Julian and Andrew Lewis. Gonna
Sit at the Welcome Table. Cincinnati, Ohio:
Thomson Learning Custom Publishing, 2000. Over
800 pages of primary documents including comics, articles,
photographs, charts and graphs on the African-American
Civil Rights Movement. |
 Burns,
Steward. Daybreak
of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott. Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina Press. More
than 100 original documents are woven together to provide
a riveting account of the boycott. |
|  *Carson,
Clayborne, et al, eds. The
Eyes
on the Prize: Civil Rights Reader: Documents,
Speeches, and Firsthand Accounts from the Black Freedom
Struggle, 1954-1990. New York: Penguin USA,
1991. This book is a collection of over 100
court decisions, speeches, interviews, and other documents
on the Civil Rights Movement from 1954 to 1990. Included
in the collection are the Brown v. Board of Education
decision of the Supreme Court that declared legally
segregated schools to be unconstitutional, Martin
Luther King’s “Letter from Birmingham
City Jail,” Harold Washington’s inaugural
speech after being elected mayor of Chicago, and the
speech delivered by Nelson Mandela in Atlanta in June
1990. (Library Journal).
|
 Foner,
Phililip S., ed. The
Black Panthers Speak. New York: Da Capo Press,
1995. The first and still the most accessible
single source of original material on the Black Panther
Party with cartoons, flyers, Panther paper articles,
and essays.
|
 Hampton,
Henry and Steve Fayer. Voices
of Freedom: An Oral History of the Civil Rights Movement
from the 1950s through the 1980s. Reissue
edition. New York: Bantam, 1991. The book
is organized in 31 chapters around key events, with
demonstrators offering complementary perspectives.
We hear from ordinary people along with well-known
activists Ralph Abernathy, Rosa Parks, Jesse Jackson,
and Stokely Carmichael; public officials John Conyers
and Nicholas Katzenbach; Black Panthers Huey Newton
and Bobby Seale; Alex Haley, Coretta Scott King, Ossie
Davis, Tom Hayden, Michael Harrington, and Harry Belafonte.
Collectively the testimonies reveal how far America
has progressed in the drive for equality and how far
it still has to go. (Publishers Weekly)
|
 Jackson,
Jonathan Jr. Soledad
Brother: The Prison Letters of George Jackson.
Chicago: Lawrence Hill, 1994. Jackson gained
notoriety shortly before his death in 1970 when his
younger brother unsuccessfully tried to free him at
gunpoint when Jackson and two others were on trial
for killing a guard. Written between 1964 and 1970
while serving time in Soledad Prison for robbery,
the letters reveal the brutality and racism faced
by prisoners and call for unity among African Americans.
(Library Journal)
|
 King,
Casey and Linda Barrett Osborne. Oh
Freedom!: Kids Talk about the Civil Rights Movement
with the People Who Made It Happen. Minneapolis,
Minn.: Econo-Clad Books, 1997. A unique collection
of oral histories about the Civil Rights Movement that
grew out of a fourth-grade assignment. The interviews,
all conducted by children, are organized into three
sections: “Life Under Segregation,” “The
Movement to End Legalized Segregation,” and “The
Struggle to End Poverty and Discrimination.” (School
Library Journal) ES/MS |
|  Levine,
Ellen. Freedom’s
Children. New York: William Morrow & Company, 1993. First-person accounts of 30
young Freedom Movement activists from the 1950s and
1960s. Recommended for grades six-12. ES/MS
|
 Martin,
Waldo E. Jr. Brown
v. Board of Education: A Brief History with Documents.
New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s Press, 1998. Offering complete or near complete versions
of relevant legal briefs and court decisions, this
book provides a solid social history brought to life
by newspaper editorials, political cartoons, and other
materials from the Brown decision era. (Teaching Tolerance)
|
 *Martínez,
Elizabeth, ed. Letters
From Mississippi: Personal Reports From Civil Rights
Volunteers of the 1964 Freedom Summer. Brookline,
Mass.: Zephyr Press, 2002. A collection of
letters written to family and friends by more than
150 of the volunteers in the 1964 Mississippi Summer
Project. An invaluable resource for bringing that
watershed summer to life for middle school through
adult readers.
|
| *Martínez, Elizabeth,
ed. 500
Anos Del Pueblo Chicano / 500 Years of Chicano History:
In Pictures. Albuquerque, New Mexico: SouthWest
Organizing Project, 1991. This classic photographic
history of the Chicano people includes over 300 photos.
|
| |
 Raines,
Howell. My
Soul Is Rested. New York: Putnam, 1977. Collection of personal statements and reminisces of
Movement activists and leaders from Montgomery Bus Boycott
through King’s assassination. |
 Reporting
Civil Rights Part One and Two: American Journalism
1941-1973. New York: The
Library of America, 2003. A two-volume set
that covers, through actual newspaper and magazine
accounts of the era, the entire struggle for civil
rights in the United States. Part One: American
Journalism 1941-1963 captures the Brown
decision, while Part
Two: American Journalism 1963-1973 covers
many of the struggles associated with integration.
A companion website www.reportingcivilrights.org
is sponsored by Teaching Tolerance.
|
 Rochelle,
Belinda. Witnesses
to Freedom: Young People Who Fought for Civil Rights.
New York: E.P. Dutton, 1993. Stories of young
people who made a difference, Central High in Little
Rock, Montgomery Bus Boycott, Sit-ins, etc. MS
|
 Webb,
Sheyann and Rachael West Nelson (as told to Frank
Sikora). Selma,
Lord, Selma: Girlhood Memories of the Civil-Rights
Days. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press,
1980. Sheyann Webb was eight years old and
Rachel West was nine when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
arrived in Selma, Alabama, on January 2, 1965, to
organize peaceful demonstrations to protest discriminatory
voting laws. Selma, Lord, Selma is their firsthand
account of the events of that turbulent winter of
1965—events that changed the lives of all Alabamians
and all Americans. From 1975 to 1979 journalist Frank
Sikora conducted interviews with the two young women
and wove their recollections into this poignant story
of fear and courage, heartbreak, and determination.
(University of Alabama Press) ES/MS
|
|  *Williams,
Juan. My
Soul Looks Back in Wonder: Voices of the Civil Rights
Experience. New York: Sterling Publishing
Co., 2004. Deeply personal in tone, My
Soul Looks Back in Wonder presents stirring,
thought-provoking, eyewitness accounts from people
who played active roles in the civil rights movement
over the past 50 years. All the narratives are drawn
from AARP’s
Voices of Civil Rights project…. It isn’t
just about the past; although the terrible age of
segregation is covered, the powerful words and intimate
experiences that unfold on every page reveal just
how much the civil rights revolution remains a vital
force today. Every speaker makes clear that the struggle
for equality must continue now, and into the future.
The various individuals who offer their unique perspectives
come from every age group, and from a variety of racial
and ethnic backgrounds. Taken together, their tales
create a fresh, intimate view of history in the making
and reveal just how much the battle for civil rights
touched the lives of every American in the most profound
way. |
 Williams,
Yohuru, ed. A
Constant Struggle: African-American History Since 1965,
Documents and Essays. Dubuque, Iowa: Kendall/Hunt,
2003. The textbook, which is in use at universities,
is a compilation of essays and documents relating to
African-American history topics, including three essays
written by Dr. Williams (Delaware State University). |
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