Komozi Woodard

Can the biography of Black leaders replace the history of African Americans? Or does biography raise of the problem of the "Great Man" theory of history? In terms of history, what is gained and what is lost in the biographical approach? In this lecture, students will consider this question as they examine the recent award-winning biographies of Frederick Douglass, W. E. B. Du Bois, Ida B. Wells, Rosa Parks, Fannie Lou Hamer, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, and so forth. Students will look at the lives of several artists and writers to explore different definitions of leadership. The weekly readings will be complemented by weekly film screenings, placing Black leadership in historical context.

For decades, historians sought the origins of Jim Crow in the South; however, Jim Crow was born on the stage and in the streets of places like New York City. Thus, recent historiography focuses serious attention on the rise of the Jim Crow North, beginning with northern slavery and the Atlantic Slave Trade in important port cities such as Boston, Philadelphia, and New York. Some historians think that interrogating those neglected northern roots will fill serious gaps in our knowledge of how racial oppression took shape in American democracy.

By the 20th century, African Americans produced distinctive ethos and aesthetics of pleasure in music and dance. Artists like Paul Robeson, Bessie Smith, Ma’ Rainey, Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Lester Young, and Duke Ellington were paradigmatic in that cultural production. In turn, the Blues ethos and Jazz aesthetics influenced the African American imagination in social, political, economic, and cultural life. Students in this seminar are encouraged to research music, dance, art, theatre, film, sports, or architecture.

By the 20th century, African Americans produced a distinctive ethos and aesthetic of pleasure not only in music and dance but also in sports and other creative arts. Artists like Paul Robeson, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, Billie Holiday, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Lester Young, Duke Ellington, and John Coltrane were paradigmatic in that cultural production. In turn, the blues ethos and jazz aesthetics influenced the African American imagination in social, political, economic, and cultural life, as well as in architecture and science.

African American history is an important window into the history of the United States and the rise of the modern world. This course explores classic narratives and examines major developments. The classic slave narratives are stories of self-emancipation and self-determination. The major developments range from the Atlantic Slave Trade to the Black Renaissance. On the one hand, students examine the dynamics of modern racism; on the other, students explore the contours of African American social, cultural, and intellectual history. In this course, there will be weekly conferences for the first six weeks and biweekly conferences thereafter.

This yearlong history lecture examines four dimensions of the 1960s Black Revolt: Malcolm X, the Black Panthers, the Young Lords, and the Black Arts Movement. The new scholarship on Malcolm X and Black Power re-examines important primary sources, including Malcolm X’s siblings. The trajectory of the Black Panther Party (BPP) has its roots in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Lowndes County and Greene County, Alabama. In turn, Malcolm X, SNCC, and BPP leaders inspired the Puerto Rican Young Lords. Finally, the Black Arts Movement links those groups to the Black Cultural Revolution.

This course will examine the distinctive leadership of women in the formation of the Black Freedom Movement. Departing from older scholarship that presents a “leading man” narrative of self-emancipation, this seminar will explore the rich lives and legacies of women, recognizing that they were their own liberators. From Harriet Tubman and Ida B. Wells to Margaret Walker, Gwendolyn Brooks, Maya Angelou, Fannie Lou Hamer, Angela Davis, Kathleen Cleaver, and Assata Shakur, generations of leaders shaped the Black radical tradition. Students are invited to learn the epic yet untold stories of the “war on terror” pioneered by Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, Claudia Jones, Esther Cooper Jackson, Denise Oliver-Velez, Ericka Huggins, Queen Mother Moore, Gloria Richardson, Septima Clark, Diane Nash, Ella Baker, and Vicki Garvin, alongside rethinking the legacies of Rosa Parks, Fannie Lou Hamer, Shirley Graham Du Bois, Yuri Kochiyama, and so forth. Rather than examining one-dimensional caricatures of those leaders, this course will explore three-dimensional lives as well as their levers of power from cultural workshops to grassroots organizations.

By the 20th century, African Americans had produced a distinctive ethos and aesthetic of pleasure—not only in music and dance but also in sports, including the Negro Leagues and boxing clubs. In Harlem, an early Black professional basketball team played its games on a dance floor. Excluded from the early white professional basketball leagues, African Americans developed their own styles and strategies in street ball. They introduced those styles to Black college leagues. As African Americans finally entered the NBA, they transformed the American game with their strategic thinking. Similar dynamics developed in Negro League baseball, football, and boxing clubs. Weekly film screenings complement the readings in this lecture.

For decades, students sought the origins of Jim Crow in the South; however, Jim Crow was born in New York City. Thus, recent history has focused serious attention on the rise of the Jim Crow North, beginning with northern slavery and the Atlantic Slave Trade in important port cities such as Boston, Philadelphia, and New York. Some historians think that those northern roots amount to a serious gap in the knowledge of how racial oppression took shape in American democracy.

Who owns history? Did Black lives ever matter? Who is visible in our textbooks? Tragically, white supremacy is the master narrative that dominates the US history textbooks, insisting that white men were center stage in building America. The new historians have challenged that master narrative, directing the spotlight to the folks who built America. This lecture includes readings, discussions, and film screenings that shed new light on the role of Black workers who wrote self-emancipation narratives under the lash; on African American women writers, directors, actors, dancers, and artists in the Black Chicago Renaissance and the Harlem Renaissance, who shaped urban culture during the Popular Front and the Great Depression; on the rise of African American Muslims, who built communities and resisted racism; and on the historical voices of Rosa Parks and Maya Angelou, who retold the epic of the Black Revolt and reclaimed the role of women in the making of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. The screenings shed light on the many people who together made America, including the tremendous obstacles they overcame from the Dred Scott decision and the Chinese Exclusion Act to political barriers against Mexican Americans and Puerto Ricans. Alongside Maya Angelou, Rosa Parks, and Fannie Lou Hamer, the women in the Young Lords, the IWK (I Wor Kuen), and the Black Panthers insist that their voices matter.