We Are an African People: 2017 Hooks National Book Award Presentation

Russell Rickford leads a discussion about his 2016 Hooks National Book Award winning work, We Are an African People: Independent Education, Black Power, and the Radical Imagination. October 19, 2017.

In the midst of the more well-studied educational changes of the school desegregation era, a handful of "Pan African nationalist" independent black schools emerged as an alternative mechanism for African-American uplift. We Are an African People examines the ideas and motivations behind these autonomous black institutions and places them within a broader discussion about how best to achieve liberation for the next generation of African Americans. Rickford's work expands upon the understanding of a very specific topic within the quest for the intellectual liberation of African-Americans and grapples with very broad questions about education, freedom and the diversity of viewpoints during the civil rights era.

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