The American Way: Edith Sampson, the NAACP, and African American Identity in the Cold War

Laville, Helen; Lucas, Scott

doi:10.1111/j.1467-7709.1996.tb00287.x

Cited by 12 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…184 Yet, much work remains to be done to 'engender' black internationalism. 185 Revisiting the discourse of those activists who refused narrower formulations of civil rights means coming to terms with a tremendous counter-factual history, the 'archive of historical possibilities lost to the Red Scare' and other 'hidden archives of human struggle and political engagement'. 186 It means historians must continue to consider political arenas other than the voting booth, the public march or the desegregating classroom.…”

Section: Conclusion: Violence In Us Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

“We Charge Genocide”: Revisiting black radicals’ appeals to the world community1

Helps¹

2018

Radical Americas

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In 1951, black radical William Patterson presented the United Nations with a petition, emblazoned with the title We Charge Genocide. The document charged the US government with snuffing out tens of thousands of black lives each year, through police violence and the systemic neglect of black citizens' well-being. While historians have tended to discuss We Charge Genocide as a remarkable but brief episode, the petition built on prior attempts to invoke international law on behalf of African Americans and resonated with later generations of black activists whose political activism transcended more limited and domestic notions of civil rights. These later invocations of the genocide charge spanned the black left, including the Black Panther Party, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, James Baldwin and black feminists. This essay explores how the historical memory of racial violence, including settler colonialism and the slave trade, inspired an ideologically diverse array of organizations to each connect their experience to global histories of racial oppression. It stresses the internationalist and anticolonial perspective of the genocide charge and its proponents' economic and transnational critique, thereby contributing to the historiographies of the long civil rights movement and black radicalism. By invoking international law, these black radicals connected the civil rights movement in the US to the struggle for human rights worldwide. Finally, the essay considers how integrating the local, national and global scales of racialized violence and its response enables historians to transnationalize the long civil rights movement paradigm.

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Section: Conclusion: Violence In Us Historymentioning

confidence: 99%

“We Charge Genocide”: Revisiting black radicals’ appeals to the world community1

Helps¹

2018

Radical Americas

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“…32 African Americans who worked with the U.S. government should not be seen as passive figures that blindly followed the wishes of the state. 33 Black individuals and organizations that cooperated with the State Department challenged racism at home and abroad, while questioning aspects of U.S. foreign policy within the broader ideological conflict between "Western democracy" and "Soviet totalitarianism." 34…”

Section: The Ncnw: Black Internationalism and The Cold Warmentioning

confidence: 99%

The National Council of Negro Women and South Africa: Black Internationalism, Motherhood, and the Cold War

Grant¹

2016

Palimpsest

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“…Often, comparisons between race and caste became little more than defensive maneuvers in the Cold War. Consider, for example, what inspired African American lawyer Edith Sampson to declare in Delhi, “I would rather be the lowliest, most downtrodden Negro in the United States than one of your Untouchables” (Laville and Lucas 1996: 572). The context of Sampson's statement, as a response to questions about racism in the United States, makes evident that her reference to caste was employed in defense of the nation.…”

Section: Race Caste and The Cold War Nationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Translating Race and Caste

Slate¹

2011

J Historical Sociology

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In the late nineteenth century, Indian and African American social reformers began to compare struggles against racial oppression in the United States with movements against caste oppression in India. The majority of these reformers ignored what was lost in translating messy particularities of identity, status and hierarchy into the words "race" and "caste" and then again translating between these words. While exploring the limitations of such a double translation, this article argues that race/caste analogies were often utilized in opposition to white supremacy, caste oppression, and other forms of injustice.

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The American Way: Edith Sampson, the NAACP, and African American Identity in the Cold War

Cited by 12 publications

References 2 publications

“We Charge Genocide”: Revisiting black radicals’ appeals to the world community1

“We Charge Genocide”: Revisiting black radicals’ appeals to the world community1

The National Council of Negro Women and South Africa: Black Internationalism, Motherhood, and the Cold War

Translating Race and Caste

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