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The Black Scholar

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The Black Scholar: Journal of Black Studies and Research

The Black Scholar: Journal of Black Studies and Research is an internationally acclaimed journal founded by Dr. Robert Chrisman and co-edited with Dr. Robert L. Allen. The Black Scholar began publication in 1969 and has been hailed by the New York Times as "a journal in which the writings of many of today's finest black thinkers may be viewed."

The entire spectrum of black political and cultural thought appears in the pages of The Black Scholar, represented by leading writers such as Clarence Lusane, Melba Joyce Boyd, Manning Marable and Maulana Karenga. Each issue focuses on a subject of major concern in the African American community. Education, black political empowerment, social movements, the multicultural debate, black women's activism, the crisis of the black male, the Ebonics debate, the Million Man March, the New South Africa and many other fundamental subjects have all been probed in the pages of The Black Scholar, which often receives national and international acclaim. There's an almost-complete list of The Black Scholar back issues near the end of this page.

Among The Black Scholar's other contributors have been Amiri Baraka, Angela Davis, Julian Bond, Shirley Chisholm, Audre Lorde, Max Roach, Nelson Mandela, Maya Angelou, and Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

Source: The Black Scholar Web site. Note: There is a section for comments, suggestions, or corrections at the bottom of the page.

Robert Chrisman - Founding Publisher and Editor-in-Chief

Robert Chrisman is a poet and essayist who's been a visiting professor at the University of California at Berkeley, Chair of the Black Studies Department of the University of Nebraska at Omaha until mid-2005 and the principal organizer of that department's Malcolm X Festival for three years. Dr. Chrisman's current research interests include: the impact of modernism on Afro-American authors of the twentieth century; and works of the Afro-Cuban poets, Nicolas Guillen and Nancy Morejon. He published Pan-Africanism (1974), as co-compiler with Nathan Hare,  Court of Appeal: The Black Community Speaks Out on the Racial and Sexual Politics of Thomas vs. Hill (1992), and Robert Hayden: Essays on the Poetry, as co-editor with Laurence Goldstein (2001). This lens has an Amazon module for Dr. Chrisman's books that are currently in print. Dr. Chrisman also was co-compiler (with Dr. Hare) of Contemporary Black Thought: The Best from The Black Scholar (1974), which is out of print.

Robert L. Allen - Senior Editor

Robert L. Allen is Professor of African American Studies & Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. His areas of interest include social movements, labor studies, and race & gender studies. Dr. Allen is the author of Black Awakening in Capitalist America (1990); Reluctant Reformers: The Impact of Racism on Social Movement in the U.S. (1983); The Port Chicago Mutiny (1989, republished 2006); Brotherman: The Odyssey of Black Men in America (with Herb Boyd, reprinted 1996); Strong in the Struggle (the life of labor leader Lee Brown), Honoring Sergeant Carter: A Family's Journey to Uncover the Truth About an American Hero (2004); and A Guide to Black Power in America: An Historical Analysis (1970). Dr. Allen currently is researching the life and work of C.L. Dellums, a leader of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters Union. This lens has an Amazon module below for Dr. Allen's books and other published writings.

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The Black Scholar 40th Anniversary Celebration - November 19 and 20, 2009

The Black Scholar celebrated 40 years of continuous publishing with a conference hosted by the Department of African American Studies, UC Berkeley, at the Lippman Room, Barrows Hall.

The Two-Day Conference Featured:
  • Charles P. Henry hosted a panel, "Barak Obama: the First Year." Prof. Henry is Chair, Dept. of African American Studies, UC Berkeley, and author of Long Overdue: The Politics of Racial Reparations (New York University Press, 2007)
  • Ernest Allen, Jr. Professor of African American History at the W. E. B. Du Bois Dept. of Afro-American Studieds, digital archivist and filmmaker, presented a feature-length documentary film, "Look Back in Wonder," on the formation of the Dept. at UMass. Amherst and its highly successful Ph.D. program.
  • Melba Joyce Boyd, Chair, Dept. of Africana Studies, Wayne State University, Detroit, offered a panel on the topic, "The progressive black artist — poetry, music, fiction and film."
  • Special performance by the John Handy Quartet.
  • Awards Luncheon
Additional featured speakers included Robert Chrisman, Rober L. Allen, and Laura H. Chrisman.

From Vol. 39, No. 3-4 (Fall/Winter 2009.)

Vol. 38, No. 1: The Candidacy of Barack Obama

Guest Editor: Dr. Charles P. Henry, Professor, University of California, Berkeley

Preface to the Spring 2008 issue:

The campaign of Senator Barack Obama for President of the United States provides a rare crystallization of U.S. historical, political, and social movement. Issues of racism, gender, generation, and national identity are reticulated through the prism of Obama's candidacy. We have dedicated a special issue of The Black Scholar to this subject. Dr. Charles P. Henry, Professor and Chair of the Department of Black Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and a leading black political scientist, has served as Guest Editor and assembled major scholars for this effort.

As Charles Henry points out in his article, "Obama '08 -- Articulate and Clean," Obama's march to the Presidency has been on a road cleared by purposeful black political activity and leadership in modern times, commencing with the Voter Rights Act of 1965, the 1972 presidential candidacy of Cong. Shirley Chisholm and the l984 and 1988 campaigns of Reverend Jesse Jackson.

Ronald Walters seizes precisely upon the timing of Obama and the historical moment in his essay, "Obama's Edge: Understanding Nation Time," as the black candidacy moved from a flank movement into central command of U.S. consciousness in 2008. Walters notes the juxtaposition of Obamas' new vision with the degradation of the U.S. population, resources, and morale by George W. Bush's presidency. With the phrase, "our time has come," Obama tapped into the conscious and unconscious political will of alienated Americans.

The international aspects of Barack Obama's candidacy are treated in Clarence Lusane's "We Must Lead the World: The Obama Doctrine and the Re-branding of U.S. Hegemony," which assesses both the status quo postures of Obama foreign policy, as well as the prospects for change that his transparency and legacy of Black political vision offer.

Central to this candidacy has been the competition with Senator Hillary Clinton, herself an historical first. A leading feminist, Alice Walker's "Lest We Forget: an Open Letter to My Sisters," traces her own personal history anti finds in it the rational for black political movement and supporting Obama's candidacy,

We consider methodology as Diane Pinderhughes explores the complex intersection of gender, race, and class interest in "Intersectionality: Race and Gender in the 2008 Presidential Nomination Campaign." Ronald Williams' II article, "Barack Obama and the Complicated Boundaries of Blackness" offers a review of the literature. Williams explores the ambiguities of African American identities, with emphasis upon conditions and characteristics of indigenous and non-indigenous African Americans.

We are also pleased to publish a major text by Barack Obama, his address delivered in Philadelphia on March 18, 2008, "To Form a More Perfect Union," a forthright discussion of racism and its effects, as it impedes the full realization of American democracy. Obama reaffirms his belief in "the more perfect union of the Constitution," a belief which comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. ... (and which) also comes from my own American story." We hope you enjoy this issue. As always, feel free to send us a letter with your reactions.

The Editors

Links to Articles about and References to The Black Scholar and its Editors

Robert Allen Testifies in Favor of Port Chicago National Memorial Bill at Congressional Hearing
In conjunction with the bill to improve management of the Port Chicago National Memorial submitted by congressman George Miller (D-California, 7th District), Dr. Robert Allen, author of The Port Chicago Mutiny testified:

"The magnitude of the Port Chicago explosion, and its cost in lives and destruction, were front-page news around the nation. But, in the midst of war, of course, new dramatic headlines quickly replace yesterday's stories. Port Chicago soon faded from the news, and was in danger of being lost to memory. We need a national memorial so that the tragic story of Port Chicago is not forgotten, so that all those who served and died at Port Chicago are remembered and honored for their service to the nation."

Dr. Allen and Eugene Sayles, who was present at the Port Chicago tragedy, testified on September 27, 2007.
Robert Chrisman and "Letting 1,000 Flowers Bloom"
Subtitled "How The Black Scholar and its editor Robert Chrisman influenced generations," this February 2005 article by Leo Adam Biga from Omaha's weekly The Reader is based on a wide-ranging interview with Robert Chrisman. The article covers Prof. Chrisman's 36-year stint as founding publisher and editor-in-chief of The Black Scholar.

The article is no longer available directly from The Reader so this URL points to a copy created from a now-vanished Google cache. This article also was reproduced in Vol. 36, No. 2-3 (Summer-Fall 2006), pp. 3-6.
"Historical Overviews of The Black Arts Movement"
This essay by Kalamu ya Salaam is from Modern American Poetry, "An Online Journal and Multimedia Companion to Anthology of Modern American Poetry" (Oxford University Press, 2000), edited by Cary Nelson.

Salaam (born Val Ferdinand III), a New Orleans playwright, poet and essayist, quotes from a 1995 Robert Chrisman interview: "If we had not had a Black Arts movement in the sixties we certainly wouldn't have had national Black literary figures like Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Alice Walker, or Toni Morrison because much more so than the Harlem Renaissance, in which Black artists were always on the leash of white patrons and publishing houses, the Black Arts movement did it for itself. What you had was Black people going out nationally, in mass, saying that we are an independent Black people and this is what we produce."
Robert L. Allen and the Long Walk to Freedom
The San Francisco Main Library held in February 2002 a living-history exhibition, The Long Walk to Freedom, and reception that "explored a crucial time when ordinary people did extraordinary things" and "highlight[ed] the contributions of twelve civil rights activists of the 1960s who helped change the face of our nation."

One of the Long Walk to Freedom's twelve honorees was Robert L. Allen, "an award-winning author, professor of Ethnic and African American Studies at UC Berkeley, and senior editor of The Black Scholar."

The Long Walk to Freedom traveled to One Market Street in San Francisco from June 7 to July 26, 2003 and to the African American Museum and Library at Oakland, September 2003 to January 2004.

The African American Museum and Library at Oakland (AAMLO)'s mission is "to discover, preserve, interpret and share the historical and cultural experiences of African Americans in California and the West for present and future generations." AAMLO's archives consist of more than 160 collections of correspondence, photographs, and microfilmed publications.
Robert Chrisman: Minor Casualties
This review by E. Ethelbert Miller (Howard University) of Robert Chrisman's second volume of verses appeared in the Spring 1996 issue of the African American Review.

Miller concludes: "Minor Casualties is evidence that the African American intellectual continues to find his or her voice in many genres. Poetry is so vital to our survival. Chrisman helps to keep an important tradition alive."
Robert L. Allen and The Port Chicago Mutiny
Dr. Robert L. Allen's The Port Chicago Mutiny, originally published in 1989, reprinted in 1993, and republished in 2006, inspired Sandra Evers-Manly and the Black Hollywood Education and Resource Center (BHERC) to honor 12 African-American survivors of the July 17, 1944 blast. BHERC sponsored "Remembering the Men of Port Chicago," the largest reunion of survivors of the tragedy during 1998's Black History Month in Los Angeles. BHERC flew the men to Sacramento, where they were honored by California State Assemblyman Roderick Wright, 48th District, and other legislators.

BHERC's Port Chicago Survivors Support Committee recounts, "On February 22, 1998, the BHERC honored Robert Allen, author of The Port Chicago Mutiny, during the 'Remembering the Men of Port Chicago' event, hosted by the Center. Allen was presented the Joseph Small Legacy Award, named after Port Chicago Survivor Joseph R. Small, Jr., who helped Allen write the first chapter of his insightful book. Small died November 3, 1996."

U.S. Congressman George Miller (D-California, 7th Congressional District) praised Ms. Evers-Manly in his Port Chicago Update message of March 23, 1999: "[T]he grassroots work by Sandra Evers-Manly and the Black Hollywood Education and Resource Center have been of crucial importance in raising the profile of this [pardon appeal] issue." President Clinton gave former sailor Freddie Meeks of Los Angeles a presidential pardon on December 23, 1999. Meeks was one of three of the 50 sailors convicted of mutiny that were known to be alive in 1999. Meeks died at the age of 83 on June 19, 2003 in Los Angeles.

Ms. Evers-Manly was instrumental in bringing about the filming of NBC Television's "Mutiny" movie-of-the-week, which was co-produced for Revelations Entertainment by Morgan Freeman, Lori McCreary and David Israel. "Mutiny" aired on Sunday, March 28, 1999.

The latest edition of Dr. Allen's book is published by Berkeley's Heyday Books in collaboration with San Francisco's Equal Justice Society. The Equal Justice Society commissioned "Port Chicago: Suite for Jazz Orchestra," composed by Marcus Shelby with libretto by Val Hendrickson and based on Robert Allen's The Port Chicago Mutiny, which premiered on December 8, 2004 at San Francisco's Regency Center.

The Equal Justice Society sponsored a CD release party for the suite at Yoshi's at Jack London Square in Oakland on February 21 - 22, 2006.
"Reflections on Cuba: History, Memory, Race, and Solidarity"
Lisa Brock's essay, "Reflections on Cuba: History, Memory, Race, and Solidarity," from the Spring 1999 issue of Souls magazine includes this reference to Robert Chrisman's journey to Cuba with several noted African-American scholars:

"Some African-American intellectuals throughout history have indeed taken up the challenge of interrogating that relationship. In 1977, for instance, the Black Scholar published a special issue on Cuba [Vol. 8, No. 8-10: Report from Cuba, Summer 1977]. The issue combined essays by artists. intellectuals, and activists such as Bernice Johnson-Reagon and Alice Walker, who had traveled to Cuba with Robert Chrisman, the editor of The Black Scholar. Johnson-Reagon, Walker, Johnnetta Cole, and others wrote about their experiences and impressions of the Cuban revolution at that time."

Dr. Brock is Chairperson of the Liberal Education Department and Professor of History and Cultural Studies at Columbia College Chicago.

Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture and Society is a quarterly interdisciplinary journal that's sponsored by the Center for Contemporary Black History, a resource center of the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University. Souls is edited by Dr. Manning Marable.
Nathan Hare Biography
Nathan Hare, a noted sociologist and clinical psychologist, was a Founding Publisher (with Robert Chrisman) of The Black Scholar: Journal of Black Studies and Research from 1969 to 1975.

From 1968 to 1969, Dr. Hare was coordinator of the the Black Studies Program at San Francisco State College (now San Francisco State University), which was the first college-level Black Studies program in the U.S.

Dr. Hare co-compiled Pan-Africanism and Contemporary Black Thought: The Best from The Black Scholar with Dr. Chrisman.
The Black Scholar Mission Statement (1969)
Dr. Quintard Taylor, Jr. provides in his "History 322: 20th Century African American History Manual," Chapter 7, "The Struggle Continues, The Black Power Era, 1965-1980" a section on The Black Scholar and a copy of the mission statement from the journal's inaugural issue (Vol 1, No. 1, November 1969) with this preface:

"On November 1969 the first issue of The Black Scholar: Journal of Black Studies and Research appeared. As the statement below attests, The Black Scholar was the first journal to situate itself in both the scholarship and activism of the black power period. The journal continues to this day."

THE BLACK SCHOLAR has been born out of the struggle of black scholars, black intellectuals, black leaders--all black people--for an education that will provide meaningful defini­tions of black existence. So born, THE BLACK SCHOLAR is the first journal of black studies and research in this country.

We recognize that we must redefine our lives. We must shape a culture, a politics, an economics, a sense of our past and future history. We must recognize what we have been and what we shall be, retaining that which has been good and discarding that which has been worthless.

THE BLACK SCHOLAR shall be the journal for that definition. In its pages, black ideologies will be examined, debated, dis­puted and evaluated by the black intellectual community. Arti­cles which research, document and analyze the black experience will be published, so that theory is balanced with fact, and ideology with substantial information.

We cannot afford division any longer if our struggle is to bear fruit, whether those divisions be between class, caste or func­tion. Nothing black is alien to us.

A black scholar recognizes this fact. He is a man of both thought and action, a whole man who thinks for his people and acts with them, a man who honors the whole community of black experience, a man who sees the Ph.D., the janitor, the businessman, the maid, the clerk, the militant, as all sharing the same experience of blackness, with all its complexities and its rewards.

THE BLACK SCHOLAR is the journal for such a man. It is your journal. Support it.

Source: The Black Scholar: Journal of Black Studies and Research 1:1 (November 1969) inside cover.

Dr. Taylor is the Scott and Dorothy Bullitt Professor of American History, University of Washington, Seattle.
Brothers In Arms: A Review by Robert L. Allen
"First in Battle: Remembering the first African-American armored unit to enter combat" is a review by Dr. Rober L. Allen of Brothers in Arms: The Epic Story of the 761st Tank Battalion, WWII's Forgotten Heroes by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Anthony Walton.

The review appeared in the Sunday, May 30, 2004 edition of the Washington Post and was found by the News Archive search feature that Google introduced on September 6, 2006. The Washington Post is one of the few archives that don't charge between $2.95 to $9.95 for inividual stories. See the "References to The Black Scholar in the Google News Archive" article below.
Robert Chrisman Takes on John McWhorter: Equal Opportunity
The "Black Professor Diverts on Affirmative Action Stance" by Mike Lehet in the October 27, 2000 issue of UC Berkeley's Daily Californian is an account of an interview with Dr. John McWhorter, who at the time taught linguistics at UC Berkeley. McWhorter wrote the controversial book, "Losing the Race: Self-Sabotage in Black America."

Lehet also interviewed Dr. Robert Chrisman, who was then a visiting professor of African-American Studies at UC Berkeley. Lehet quotes Chrisman as saying, "The book falsely attributes failure to black students on the basis of cultural thought, while virtually dismissing all notions of racism." Chrisman added other negative comments about the book.

Dr. McWhorter currently is Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, a consevative think tank. He wrote Winning the Race: Beyond the Crisis in Black America in 2006.
The Black Scholar: Tables of Contents 1994 - 2006
Detailed tables of contents for The Black Scholar Vol. 24 No. 1 (Winter 1994) to Vol. 36 No. 2-3 (Summer-Fall 2006) from the Chadwick-Healey "International Index to Black Periodicals (IIBP)." You must have a paid subscription to IIBP to view Full Citations and Full Text of these issues.

Note: Most of the IIBP's Publication Information for The Black Scholar is out of date.
The Black Scholar Citations from Google Academic
This link returns a list of articles published in The Black Scholar from about 1971 to the present. As of July 2006, there were 384 individual articles cited with an average of about two scholarly journal citations per article.

You can order copies of about half the articles from British Library Online.
References to The Black Scholar in the Google News Archive
Google announced their News Archive Search feature on September 6, 2006. A search on September 6, 2006 for "The Black Scholar" returned 195 responses, which include many with instances of "the black scholar" as a a key phrase.

Most stories cost $2.95 to $9.95 each, but some sources, such as HighBeam Research, charge a monthly fee. A few sources, such as the Washington Post and Time provide no-charge access.

Responses include links to related News Archive articles and Web pages.
University of Nebraska Press Acquires The Black Scholar
The University of Nebraska Press acquired the rights to publish The Black Scholar: Journal of Black Studies and Research from The Black World Foundation in February 2004. The University returned ownership to the Foundation in early 2005, effective January 1, 2005.
University of Nebraska Press Acquires Journal Edited by UNO's Robert Chrisman
Another press release about the University of Nebraska acquisition. There is much PR on the Internet about the The Black Scholar acquisition but no references that I can find to the return of ownership of the journal to the Black World Foundation.

Robert Chrisman's Books

Books written or edited by Rober Chrisman

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Robert L. Allen's Books

Books and articles written or edited by Robert L. Allen

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Links to Selected Articles by or about Black Scholar Contributors

A more-or-less reverse chronological compilation of Internet links to publications, papers and presentations by or about The Black Scholar's authors, reviewers, commentators and contributing/advisory editors.
Max Roach (1924 - 2007)
Max Roach, master jazz drummer and long-time contributing/advisory editor for The Black Scholar died in a Manhattan hospital on August 16, 2007 at the age of 83.

The Fall 2007 issue, "Black Social Agenda" carries an "In Memoriam: Max Roach (1924 - 2007) obituary by AP writer Larry McShane. According to McShane "Roach re-emerged in the free jazz era with as new political consciousness, becoming one of jazz's loudest voices for civial rights. Albums like 'We Insist! Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite,' released in 1960 to celebrate the upcoming centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, reflected his support of black activism."

Roach contributed "What Jazz Means to Me" to Vol. 3, No. 10, Summer 1972. Notable quotations from the article include:

"What jazz means to me is the worst kind of working conditions, the worst in cultural prejudice ... The term jazz has come to mean the abuse and exploitation of black musicians."

"My point is that we much decolonize our minds and re-name and re-define ourselves ... In all respects, culturally, politically, socially, we must re-define ourselves and our lives, in our own terms."

Black poet Ishmael Reed, like Roach the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant, said, "When I met Max Roach, I told him he kept me out of reform school."
John La Rose (1927 - 2006)
Vol. 37, No. 2, "Facets of Black Masculinity," carried John La Rose's obituary by Linton Kwesi Johnson from the Books section of the UK's Guardian newspaper. John La Rose was a long-time Contributing and Advisory Editor of The Black Scholar.

Among his contributions to The Black Scholar were "Unemployment, Leisure and the Birth of Creativity" (Vol. 26, No. 2, "Black Culture 1996", Summer 1996) and "Writers Have Their Right to Write" (Vol. 20, No. 2, "Black Culture", March/April 1989).

Linton Kwesi Johnson, a.k.a., "the world's first reggae poet," published "Reggae Fi Dada" in Vol. 19, Nos. 4 and 5 July-Oct. 1988. Johnson also is an independent record producer (LKJ Records.)
Interview with Distinguished Professor Melba Joyce Boyd
Melba Joyce Boyd, Distinguished Professor and chair of Wayne State University's Africana Studies Department and Black Scholar Contributing/Advisory Editor, was featured in the Winter 2006 issue of Wayne State's CLAS Notes publication. According to the article, Distinguished Professor is "one of the university's highest honors for a faculty member."

The article notes that Dr. Boyd "was the guest editor for a special issue [Vol. 33, No. 3-4, "Affirmative Action: The Rulings on Admissions Policy at the University of Michigan ...," Fall-Winter 2003] of The Black Scholar on the anti-affirmative action lawsuits against the University of Michigan. She and Dr. Robert Chrisman, publisher and editor of The Black Scholar, are extending that issue with additional essays and a revised introduction for a book project."

Dr. Boyd reviewed the recently published Oxford Anthology of African American Poetry for Vol. 36, No. 2-3, "Black International Issues: 2006," Summer/Fall 2006.
Harold Wright Cruse (March 8, 1916 - March 30, 2005)
Harold Cruse, historian, curmudgeon, and controversial author of The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual is the subject of Dr. Henry Vance Davis's essay—"Harold Wright Cruse: The Early Years and the Jewish Factor" from Vol. 35, No. 4, "Rosa Parks and Harold Cruse: Black Activists and Intellectuals." Dr. Davis is a professor of history, dean of the Social Sciences and Health Services department, and director of the Africana Institute at Ramapo College of New Jersey.

William Jelani Cobb, editor of The Essential Harold Cruse: A Reader and an assistant professor of history at Spelman College, says in his "Past Imperfect: Sharp-Tongued Truths, a Tribute to Harold Cruse" AOL "Black Voices" essay: "For decades, Cruse's central commitment remained the resolution of the issues he felt undermined black leadership -- and thereby black people. He continued his work in the 1970s at the University of Michigan as a pioneer in the field of black studies. Largely self-educated, Cruse was one of the few African-American university professors without a college degree." Read Dr. Cobb's "What is Left? An Introduction The Essential Harold Cruse: A Reader.

Much of the content of The Essential Harold Cruse: A Reader is based on Cruse's papers in New York University's Tamiment Library/Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives. The Guide to the Harold Cruse Papers 1943-1994 contains correspondence, topical files, and writings.

Harold Cruse also was the author of Rebellion or Revolution? (1968), Plural but Equal: A Critical Study of Blacks and Minorities and America's Plural Society (1987), and Marxism and the Negro Struggle, all of which are out of print. Prof. Cruse was the inspiration for Dr. Cobb's Ph.D. thesis, "Antidote to Revolution: African American Anticommunism and the Struggle for Civil Rights, 1931-1954" (Rutgers History Department). His Antidote to Revolution essay is the introduction to the thesis.

Coincidentally, Dr. Cobb also wrote an essay, "The Truth About Rosa Parks"; Rosa Parks was the other Black Activist honored by the Winter 2006 issue.

Molefe Kete Asante's "Harold Cruse and Afrocentric Theory" review and Harold Cruse's The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual Reconsidered (Jerry G. Watts, ed.) and Cynthia Young's "Havana Up in Harlem: LeRoi Jones, Harold Cruse and the Making of a Cultural Revolution" provide other perspectives on Cruses' career. Dr. Young is director of Boston College's African and African Diaspora Studies Program.

Dr. Davis previously contributed "A Critique of the Influence of the Socioeconomic Environment on the Black Press, 1900-1928" to Vol. 22, No. 3, "Black Culture 1992," (Fall 1992).
The 1st BiAnnual African American National Conference
The Black Scholar Contributing/Advisory Editors Dr. Beverly Guy-Sheftall and Dr. Abdul Alkalimat spoke at the 1st BiAnnual African American National Conference: "The Black Scholar and the State of Black America," held at Michigan State University campus in East Lansing, Michigan on April 6 through April 8, 2006. Dr. Tony Martin, Professor of Africana Studies, Wellesley College, also was a featured speaker.

The conference is sponsored by the African American and African Studies department and the Sankofa Black Studies Graduate Association at Michigan State University, Lansing.
Roberto Fernandez Retamar
Vol. 35, No. 3, "The Faces of Cuban Culture," Fall 2005, is devoted to an interview, essays, and poems by Roberto Fernandez Retamar, a distinguished Cuban poet, essayist, literary critic, and professor.

Following are a few Internet links to English publications by and about Fernandez Retamar:

• "More Than a Bird's-Eye View of My Labor" by Fernandez Retamar from World Literature Today, Summer/Autumn 2002 (PDF).
• "Roberto Fernandez Retamar & Art" by Adelaida De Juan from World Literature Today, Summer/Autumn 2002 (PDF). Coincidently, the article credits the photograph on page 6 to Agnes Varda, the French filmmaker who assembled the 1968 "Black Power" video near the bottom of this lens.
• Amazon.com page for Caliban and Other Essays, by Roberto Fernandez Retamar (English translation).
• The Cuba Reader: History, Culture, Politics. Aviva Chomsky, Barry Carr and Pamela Maria Smorkaloff (Eds.) contains articles or poems by Fernandez Retamar, Nancy Morejon, and Nicolas Guillen.
• "International Book Fair of Havana: Homage to Retamar," an interview of Fernandez Retamar by Mireya Castaneda, a Granma International staff writer.
• "Lecture on Ariel (1900) and Caliban (1971)" by Rod Marsh, University of Cambridge
• CubaNow's reproduction of part of an interview with Fernandez Retamar by John Beverley and Goffredo Diana published in Chicago University's Critical Inquiry magazine (1995) under the title "These Are The Times We Have To Live In." The page contains a link to the poem and book, "Where's Fernandez?"
• Another excerpt from Critical Inquiry magazine's "These Are The Times We Have To Live In" interview
• Excerpt from "Alejo: Always on Sunday," an essay on the life and work of Alejo Carpentier (and Fernando Retamar's friendship with the Cuban novelist, essayist, and musicologist) originally published in Iman, 1984
• A related lecture, "Alejo Carpentier, El reino de este mundo (1949)" (The Kingdom of This World) by Rod Marsh (University of Cambridge)

Alejo Carpentier is credited by some critics as the co-progenitor (with Guatamala's Miguel Angel Asturias) of the magical [sur]realism genre of modern Latin American literature.
African-American Studies in the 21st Century Conference
Vol. 35, No. 2, "Brown, Black and Beyond: African American Studies in the 21st Century", (Summer 2005) was devoted primarily to the University of Illinois
Urbana-Champaign African American Studies & Research Program's "From Brown To Black and Beyond: African American Studies in the 21st Century" conference, held April 1 through April 3, 2004 on the Urbana-Champaign campus.

Dr. Robert Chrisman, The Black Scholar's Founder, Editor-in-Chief, and Publisher; Dr. Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Anna Julia Cooper Professor, Women's Research and Resource Center at Spelman College and a Contributing/Advisory Editor for The Black Scholar; and Dr. Molefi Asante, Professor, African American Studies, Temple University, and Founding Editor of the Journal of Black Studies collaborated to present the opening plenary session entitled "Tell No Lies Claim No Easy Victories: African American Studies, Its Legacies and the Challenges Ahead."

Dr. Manning Marable, a frequent contributor to The Black Scholar, Director of the Center for Contemporary Black History, Founding Director of the Institute for Research in African-American Studies, and Professor of Political Science and Public Affairs at Columbia University, participated in Plenary Sesssion 1, "Rhythms of Change: Revisiting and Reimagining the Institutionalization of African American Studies."

The Spring 2005 issue contains the following articles by conference presenters: "Black Studies, the Talented Tenth, and the Organic Intellectual" by Robert Chrisman, "African-American Studies: Legacies & Channenbes: "What Would Black Studies Be If We'd Listened to Toni Cade?" by Beverly Guy-Sheftall, The Discipline of Africology at the Crossroads: Toward An Eshuean Response to Intellectual Dilemma" by Molefi Kete Asante, and "Beyond Brown: The Revolution in Black Studies" by Manning Marable.

Dr. Sundiata Kieta Cha-Jua, Professor of History and Director of the University of Illinois's Afro-American Studies and Research Program, provided The Black Scholar with "A Message from the Director" and the "Conference Mission Statement" for the Summer 2005 issue. Drs. Cha-Jua, Molefi Asante, Maulana Karenga are members of the Board of Directors of the National Council for Black Studies, Inc. The Council will hold its 29th Annual Conference on March 24 through March 26, 2006 at the Crowne Plaza Houston-Downtown, Houston, Texas.
Immigration Reform: Uniting Blacks and Immigrants
This article by David Bacon in Vol. 35, No. 2, "Brown, Black and Beyond: African American Studies in the 21st Century" (Summer 2005) scorns most current legislative proposals for Mexican-American guest-laborer or contract-worker status. The article appeared previously in the Winter 2004 edition of Colorlines Magazine

Instead, Bacon advocates adoption of Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee's immigration reform proposal that would "legalize undocumented people who have lived five years in the U.S., have a basic understanding of English and U.S. culture, and have no criminal record."

The following "Labor Needs a Radical Vision" item provides a brief David Bacon biography.
Labor Needs a Radical Vision
An article by David Bacon from Vol. 35, No. 1, "The Popular Struggle" (Spring 2005) reprinted by the Montly Review, a print and online publication that claims to speak "for socialism and against U.S. imperialism."

According to the Montly Review, "David Bacon is a west coast writer and photographer, and former factory worker and union organizer. His book, The Children of NAFTA: Labor Wars on the US/Mexico Border, was published last year by the University of California Press. His photodocumentary project on immigration, Beyond Borders: Transnational Working Communities, is due next year from ILR Press/Cornell University Press." Bacon also is an associate editor with the Pacific News Service and a contributor to The Nation. He's a regular guest on Belva Davis's "This Week in Northern California" television program on San Francisco's KQED-TV.
Let Us Liberate Ourselves
This call to "galvanize Afrrican-American activism" by Herb Boyd from Vol. 34, No. 3 "Black Politics 2004" (Fall 2004) elicited the response below from Jamala Rogers, a National Organizer for the Black Radical Congress (BRC).

Herb Boyd is an award-winning journalist and author. His articles have appeared in Emerge, Essence, Ebony Man, Amsterdam News, Black Elegance, Network Journal, The Source, Code, and The Black Scholar. He is the co-editor with The Black Scholar's Robert L. Allen of Brotherman: The Odyssey of Black Men in America, which received the American Book Award in 1995.

Boyd is a contributor to the I've Known Rivers: The MoAD Stories Project of San Francisco's new Museum of the African Disaspora (MoAD).
From Conference to Organization: The Challenges of Building the Black Radical Congress
An article by Jamala Rogers from Vol. 35, No. 1, "The Popular Struggle" (Spring 2005), in response to Herb Boyd's "Let's Liberate Ourselves" article in Vol. 34, No. 3 (Fall 2004). According to Rogers, Boyd used "inaccurate information about the Black Radical Congress (BRC)" in his attempt "to tackle the inability of failed organizations and stalled movements to address the plethora of issues facing the African American community." Rogers is a National Organizer for the BRC and a columnist for The St. Louis American.
The Freedom Agenda (FA) of the Black Radical Congress (BRC)
Published as "The Freedom Agenda (FA) of the Black Radical Congress (BRC) Ratified by the BRC National Council (NC) April 17, 1999, Baltimore Maryland" in the Spring 2005 issue (Vol. 35, No. 1).
Bill Cosby on Civil Rights (Audio Excerpt)
These edited audio excerpts (00:03:40) from the Washington Post of Bill Cosby's Monday, May 17, 2004 speech, were recorded at the NAACP/Howard University event to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the Supreme Court's Brown v. Topeka Board of Education decision. This speech was the primary topic of the Winter 2004 issue (Vol. 34, No. 4), "Dr. Bill Cosby Speaks at the 50th Anniversary Commemoration of the Brown v. Topeka Board of Education Supreme Court Decision, May 22, 2004"

A related Washington Post op/ed article, "Fix It, Brother" by columnist Colbert I. King casts a positive spin on Cosby's speech.
Bill Cosby Interview by Travis Smiley
This page includes links to a May 26, 2004 Bill Cosby interview by Los Angeles PBS station KCET's Travis Smiley. You can listen to the entire program, read a transcript of the interview, or both.
Biography: Johnnetta B. Cole, Ph.D.
Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole is the author of "On Speaking Truth to Ourselves and Doing Right By Our Children," from Vol. 34, No. 4, "The Bill Cosby Debate" (Winter 2004) in support of Bill Cosby's views as expressed in his controversial May 17, 2004 speech

Dr. Cole's position in the controversy raised by Dr. Cosby's speech isn't surprising in the light of his $20 million gift to Spelman College when Dr. Cole assumed the role of the college's president in 1987. Dr. Cole is a Contributing/Advisory Editor of The Black Scholar.
Reclaiming Zimbabwe: The Exhaustion of the Patriarchal Model of Liberation
Amazon link to the paperback edition of Reclaiming Zimbabwe: The Exhaustion of the Patriarchal Model of Liberation by Horace Campbell, published in August 2003 and reviewed by Biko Agozino in Vol. 34, No.4, "The Bill Cosby Debate" (Winter 2004). Biko Agozino is Associate Professor in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences of the Cheyney University of Pennsylvania and series editor for Ashgate Publishing's Interdisciplinary Research Series in Ethnic, Gender and Class Relations, which has 25 titles published or in preparation.

Here's a link to other books and articles by Biko Agozino and a review of Henry Louis ("Skip") Gates, Jr.'s Wonders of the African World BBC/PBS documentary from Vol. 30, No. 1 (Spring 2000).
Bostonians Squabble Over Headline - Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr
Black Issues in Higher Education (now Diverse Issues in Higher Education) published this article by Dr. Julianne Malveaux, a Contributing/Advisory Editor for The Black Scholar, on May 28, 1988, shortly after Boston Magazine published its April 1998 "Head Negro In Charge" article that otherwise heaped lavish praise on Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr.. The article ascribed to Dr. Gates "the most eloquent voice articulating the middle class Black experience to White America."

Slate's Franklin Foer warned readers that the article was "marred by a deeply unfortunate headline" in his April 12, 1998 "Henry Louis Gates Jr. -- The academic as entrepreneur" column. That Foer's take on the headline was an understatement is proven by the national scope of the controversy: A "RACE - Boston Is Talking ..." article in Newsweek ($2.95 payment required to view the full text), mention on NBC's "Today" show, and additional articles in the Los Angeles Times and New York Observer.

The New York Times' Brent Staples analyzed Ralph Ellison's use of the H.N.I.C. theme in his May 12, 1999 "Indivisible Man" review of The Collected Essays of Ralph Ellison. Staples sees the "political version of the H.N.I.C. [as] Invisible Man's Dr. Bledsoe, the college president who makes a grand living telling white folks what Negroes think" and the "corporate version[as] crazy Lucius Brockway, the lone colored chemist at a paint factory who goes to murderous lengths to keep it that way."

The full text of "Head Negro In Charge" by Cheryl Bentsen isn't accessible from the Boston Magazine archives, which shouldn't be unexpected. However, click here to read a Wayback Machine clone. Alternatively, you can read the full text from the African American Studies and Librarianship list server archives. Dr. Malveaux describes Bentsen's article as "awestruck and somewhat fawning."

A Black Issues in Higher Education story in the May 2005 issue, "Gates to step down as African-American studies chairman at Harvard" stated that Dr. Gates had announced in April 2005 his impending resignation as chairman of the African and African-American Studies department in 2006. The story states that Dr. Gates "intends to remain at the university," which undoubtedly surprised no one.
The War on the Dark Corners of the World
Vol. 33, No. 1 "Black Film & Culture" (Spring 2003) included Fidel Castro's "War on the Dark Corners of the World: Resisting the Doctirne of Pre-emptive Strike." This link is to a version published by the CounterPunch newsletter.

The somewhat off-topic essay concerns a statement from President George W. Bush's June 1, 2002 speech to West Point graduating cadets: "Our security will require transforming the military you will lead, a military that must be ready to strike at a moment's notice in any dark corner of the world."

Poet Eliot Katz wrote a longer essay for CounterPunch on this issue: "To Declare Pre-emptive War is to Declare a Bankruptcy of the Imagination."
African-American Leadership and Mass Mobilization
Link to "African-American Leadership and Mass Mobilization," an article by Clayborne Carson, in Vol. 24, No. 4, "Black Popular Movements" (Fall 1994). Dr. Carson is Professor of History and Director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers Project at Stanford University. Here's an Amazon link to Dr. Carson's books, articles, and contributions to others' books.
The US Organization, Black Power Vanguard Politics, and the United Front Ideal
Scot Brown is Associate Professor of History at UCLA and a member of the core faculty of the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African-American Studies at UCLA. Dr. Brown is an authority on the history of the Us Organization, the Los Angeles black nationalist group which founded the Kwanzaa celebration.

The Amazon link points to Dr. Brown's "The US Organization, Black Power Vanguard Politics, and the United Front Ideal: Los Angeles and Beyond" from Vol. 31, No. 3-4, "Black Power Studies: A New Scholarship" (Fall-Winter 2001). Here's a link to NYU Press's page for the related book, Maulana Karenga, the US Organization, and Black Cultural Nationalism and to reviews and the Introduction of the book. You can listen to an interview with Dr. Brown by KPFA's Walter Turner (starts at 00:40:00), which is part of the Berkeley (California) listener-sponsored station's Africa Today Archives.

From the NYU book: "Established in 1965 and chaired by Maulana Karenga, US -- the Los Angeles-based Black Power, cultural nationalist organization -- experienced a high point in its activism during a great resurgence in African American nationalism during the mid-1960s and early-70s. ... Though US still exists today, the group's stature as a leading Black Power force began to decline by the early 70s under the duress of a violent feud with the Black Panther Party, factional in-fighting, and a breakdown in leadership."

Prof. Karenga is a Contributing/Advisory Editor for The Black Scholar, and professor and chair of the Black Studies department at California State University, Long Beach. Click here to read Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s interview of Prof. Karenga for the PBS/Frontline series, "The Two Nations of Black America."
Black Liberation Without Apology: Rethinking the Black Power Movement
This Amazon.com link is to Peniel E. Joseph's article for Vol. 31, No. 3-4, "Black Power Studies I: A New Scholarship" (Fall-Winter 2001). Dr. Joseph was the Guest Editor for this issue and Vol. 32, No. 1, "Black Power Studies II." He also contributed "Winter in America: Color, Democracy, and the Presidential Election" to Vol. 31, No. 2 (Summer 2001) and "'Black Reconstructed': White Supremacy in the Post Civil Rights Era" to Vol. 25, No. 4 (Fall 1995).

Dr. Joseph is Assistant Professor of Africana Studies, SUNY-Stony Brook, and the author of Venus in the Dark: Blackness and Beauty in Popular Culture and two books to be published in 2006: Waiting 'Til the Midnight Hour: A Narrative History of Black Power in America and The Black Power Movement: Rethinking the Civil Rights-Black Power Era.
Ten Reasons: A Response to David Horowitz
Vol. 31, No. 2, "Black Election 2000" (Summer 2001) includes "Ten Reasons: A Response to David Horowitz by Robert Chrisman and Ernest Allen, Jr." Robert Chrisman is Founder and Executive Editor of The Black Scholar. Ernest Allen, Jr. is Professor of Afro-American Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and a Contributing/Advisory Editor of The Black Scholar.

Horowitz, publisher of FrontPageMag.com, a conservative newsletter, Salon.com columnist, and author of Uncivil Wars: The Controversy Over Reparations For Slavery had distributed in March 2001 a college newspaper advertisement/article headlined "Ten Reasons Why Reparations for Slavery is a Bad Idea."
FrontPageMag.com offers and extensive "Reparations Bibliography." Horowitz and others published these Salon.com columns on african-american reparations: "The Latest Civil Rights Disaster", "Debt Wrong", "Stuck on Oprah", and "Who's afraid of the big, bad Horowitz?" Horowitz later took on the Daily Princetonian, Robert Chrisman, and Ernest Allen, Jr. in his April 16, 2001 article, "Why I won't pay the Daily Princetonian." (It took a Google News Archive search to find this last citation.)

Media Matters provided extensive coverage of the controversy about the book and advertisement, as well as claims and counterclaims of racism. The San Francisco Chronicle published "Daily Cal Editor Caught Between an Ad and an Apology" by Daniel Hernandez, the editor of the Daily Californian, which was one of the five (out of 48) college newspapers that ran the ad. Chronicle columnist Debra J. Saunders's "Free Speech Dies a Bit In Berkeley" takes Hernandez to task for not reporting activists' thefts of Daily Californian issues from newsstands and characterizing the Horowitz ad as having "incorrect or blatantly inflammatory content."

For more details of Horowitz' conversion from early Black Panther ally to conservative muckraker, see the "The Black Scholar Interviews: Bobby Seale" entry later in this list.
The Black Scholar Interviews: Bobby Seale
A 16-page interview with the Black Panthers' Bobby Seale scanned by the "It's About Time - Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni" site from Vol. 4, No. 1, "Black Politics" (Septermber 1972).

You'll also find scans of cover art and an illustration for Vol. 9, No. 3, "Plastic Arts and Crafts" (November 1977), together with a brief manifesto ("Art in Service for the People") and front-page art of two Black Panther newspaper issues by Emory Douglas, the Black Panther's Minister of Culture.

The UC Berkeley Library Social Activism Sound Recording Project: The Black Panther Party has an extensive Black Panther party chronology and a few videop and audio clips from KPFA (Pacifica Radio) commencing in 1967. African American Museum and Library at Oakland (AAMLO) has microfilm copies of the the Black Panther newspaper. The Media Resources Center of UC Berkeley's Moffitt Library has many links to video and audio files on its "The Black Panther Party" pages.

Huey Newton expelled Bobby Seale from the party in August 1974. Progressive-turned-conservative David Horowitz takes exception to Black Panther internecine warfare and external violence in his FrontPageMag.com's "Black Murder, Inc." article. Horowitz' December 13, 1999 Salon.com column, "Who killed Betty Van Patter?", plows the same ground. Horowitz, who lived in Berkeley, worked with Newton to start the Oakland Community Learning Center in 1973 and was the head of its Planning Committee. Newton was arrested in 1989 for embezzling funds from this school.

[Near the bottom of this lens there's a video outtake from Agnes Varda's 1968 "Black Panthers" documentary and a segment about the Chicago police raid that resulted in the killing of Fred Hampton, the chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party.]
"To My People" by Joanne Chesimard
A three-page article by Joanne Chesimard (a.k.a. Assata Shakur) scanned by the "It's About Time - Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni" site from Vol. 5, No. 2, "Black Soldier II" (October 1973). According to the introduction, police claimed Chesimard "to be the top leader of the Black Liberation Army, ... and indicted [her] in August 1973 on murder, kidnapping and robbery charges." The PDF file also contains a scan of the cover art for the issue.
"Women in Prison: How We Are" by Joanne Chesimard
A seven-page article by Joanne Chesimard (a.k.a. Assata Shakur) and cover art scanned by the "It's About Time - Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni" site from Vol. 9, No. 7, "The Best of the Black Scholar: The Black Woman" (April 1978).
The Case of Billy Dean Smith
A three-page article about Billy Dean Smith by Mark Allen and cover art scanned by the "It's About Time - Black Panther Party Legacy & Alumni" site from Vol. 4, No. 2, "Black Prisoner II" (October 1972). Billy Dean Smith was a black Viet Nam war-resister whom the Army put on trial for "fragging" his commanding officer at Bien Hoa in March 1971.

Mark Allen was a reporter for Berkeley's Peoples World newspaper, a worker for the Soledad Brothers Defense Committee, and an unsuccessful candidate for the Berkeley City Council in 1977.

The Soledad Brothers were George Jackson, Fleeta Drumgo and John Clutchette. Attorney Fay Stender formed the Soledad Brothers Defense Committee, which Angela Y. Davis later headed. Davis was accused of assisting George Jackson's younger brother, Jonathan, to plan a kidnapping to gain George's release. She was cleared of all charges in 1972.
"African American Studies: The Future of the Discipline"
Molefi Kete Asante's article from Vol. 22 No. 3, "Afro-American Studies in the Twenty-First Century" (Summer 1992), courtesy of the University of Virginia.

Molefi Kete Asante Asante is Professor, Department of African American Studies, Temple University. Here's a link to Dr. Asante's "Criminal Archetypes in the 2000 Presidential Election: How Black Votes Were Stolen" article from Vol. 31, No. 2, "Black Election: 2000" (Summer 2001) and "'Wonders of the African World'": A Eurocentric Enterprise" from Vol. 30, No. 1, "Wonders of the African World" (Spring 2000). Click here for Amazon.com's list of Dr. Asante's print publications.

You can purchase a CD of a one-hour speech about Afrocentricity (c. 1996) by Dr. Asante from the Pacifica Radio Archives.
Angela Yvonne Davis
Angela Y. Davis is Professor of History of Consciousness at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and works with the Prisoner's Rights Movement and the National Alliance Against Racism and Political Repression. She also is a Contributing/Advisory Editor for The Black Scholar. She contributed "Reflections on the Black Woman's Role in the Community of Slaves," to Vol. 3, No. 4, "Black Woman" (December 1971), about a year after her October 13, 1970 arrest in New York City on murder and kidnapping charges arising from George Jackson's aborted escape from the Marin County Hall of Justice. She was released and all charges against her were dropped 18 months later.

Other brief Angela Davis biographies are here, here, here, and here. Click here to read an interview of Prof. Davis for the PBS/Frontline series, "The Two Nations of Black America." You can purchase a copy of "Angela's Homecoming", a 52-minute talk recorded for KPFK at the Embassy Auditorium, Los Angeles in 1972 from the Pacifica Radio Archives.
Kwame Ture/Stokely Carmichael
Vol. 27, No. 3-4, "Kwame Ture/Stokely Carmichael: Tribute to a Life of Struggle" (Fall-Winter 1997) was devoted to this early Black Power proponent and included the following articles:

"From Stokely Carmichael to Kwame Ture 'Tribute to a Life of Struggle' UMASS Campus Center Auditorium April 14, 1997"; "Revolution: From Stokely Carmichael to Kwame Ture" by Charlie Cobb; "Stokely Carmichael" by Joanne Grant; "How Malcolm and Stokely and the Movement Redefined America" by Bill Strickland; "Stokely Carmichael/Kwame Ture: Courageous Warrior in an On-going Struggle" by Clayborne Carson; "Kwame Ture in the Scales of History: 'A Legacy of Lessons'" by Maulana Karenga; "Power and Racism: What We Want" by Stokely Carmichael; "Pan-Africanism: Land and Power" by Stokely Carmichael (also appeared in Vol. 1, No. 1 (November 1969); "'We Are All Africans': A speech by Stokely Carmichael to Malcolm X Liberation University" by Stokely Carmichael; and "The Changing Political Situation in the 'Soviet Bloc' and its Positive Affect on Revolutionary Forces Throughout the World" by Kwame Ture.

Extended bibliography and related articles:
"Hell Yes, We are Going to Libya! A Declaration to Africa and the World
" speech transcript in Vol. 29, No. 1, "African Initiatives" (Spring 1999); From Civil Rights to Black Power to Pan-Africanism: The Political Legacy of Kwame Toure" by Erin Chung; and "20th Century African American History," Chapter 7, "The Struggle Continues: The Black Power Era, 1965-1980" by Dr. Quintard Taylor, Jr.
"Black Studies: A Political Perspective"
This 1969 essay by Michael Thelwell describes the problems facing participants in the establishment of effective Black Studies departments within white universities and colleges and recruiting academic staff.

The essay was published a few months before the University of Massachusetts
Amherst-Boston-Worcester published its April 22, 1970 press release announcing the approval of the W.E.B. DuBois Afro-American Studies department at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. It's probably safe to say that much of the essay is based on Prof. Threlwell experiences as a member of the UMass faculty committe. The essay concludes: "The obstacles are formidable, the opposition great, the goal, to some, perhaps quixotic, but history is full of surprises (particularly to bourgeois historians) and while the consequences of failure are dismal, it will be an unspeakable dishonor to this generation of black intellectuals if the effort is not made. We have, quite literally, nothing to lose."

[Ekwueme] Michael Thelwell is a Contributing/Advisory editor of The Black Scholar. The essay is reproduced from the Massachusetts Review (Autumn 1969): 701-12.

"Planning for the 1980's: A Status Report Submitted by The Department of Afro-American Studies University of Massachusetts/Amherst" is undated but probably issued in 1979. The report includes much of the history of the founding of UMass's Black Studies department.
John Henrik Clarke: Historian, Scholar, and Teacher
John Henrik Clarke (1915 - 1998) was a frequent contributor of afrocentric articles to The Black Scholar in the 1970s.

Cornell University's John Henrik Clarke Library's Journal/Magazine Articles (1941-1970) page includes the following references to these The Black Scholar articles: "The Impact of the African on the New World: A Reappraisal," Vol. 4, No. 5 "Pan Africanism Caribbean" (February 1973); "Marcus Garvey: The Harlem Years," Vol. 5, No. 4 (December, 1973-January, 1974); "Kwame Nkrumah: His Years in America," Vol. 6, No. 2, "Black Politics 1974" (October 1974); "Three New Approaches To African History," Vol. 7, No. 1, "Diaspora (September, 1975); "African Cultural Continuity and Slave Revolts in the New World: Part 1," Vol. 8, No. 1, "Southern Africa" September 1976; and "African Cultural Continuity and Slave Revolts in the New World: Part Two," Vol. 8, No. 2, "South Africa: The Struggle Continues" (November 1976). He contributed many articles to The Black American, Journal of African Civilization, Journal of African Civilizations, and Presence Africaine.

According to the Africana Library Web site, "Faculty of the Africana Studies & Research Center named the library in honor of Dr. John Henrik Clarke during the summer of 1985. As a distinguished historian, Dr. Clarke was instrumental in establishing the Africana Center's curriculum in the 1970s and taught courses in Black history at Cornell." The John Henrik Clarke Africana Collection is housed in Archives & Special Collections at the Atlanta University Center, Robert W. Woodruff Library. The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York, houses the John Henrik Clarke Legacy Collection.

The National Black United Front's website offers The John Henrik Clarke Virtual Museum page with links to the full text of many Clarke articles, including "From SBA to SIA: A Great And Mighty Walk," an autobiographical obituary that he wrote shortly before his death in 1998.

Documentary film director St. Claire Bourne teamed with executive producer/narrator Wesley Snipes to produce John Henrik Clarke: A Great and Mighty Walk, which was was screened at the 1997 Sundance Film Festival and garnered the Best Documentary award at the 1997 UrbanWorld Film Festival. The film also was one of the 2003 International Black Panther Film Festival Films. The Starz InBlack! (SBLK) and Sundance channels air this film periodically. Bourne also produced, directed and edited In Motion: Amiri Baraka in 1985.
A Black Value System
An Amazon.com link to an Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) article for the inaugural Vol. 1, No. 1 issue (November 1969).

University Publications of America, an imprint of Lexis-Nexis, Inc., published in 2001 a microfilm edition of "The Black Power Movement, Part 1: Amiri Baraka from Black Arts to Black Radicalism." Komozi Woodard, Professor of African-American History at Sarah Lawrence College, was the Editorial Advisor for an 82-page PDF guide to the edition.

Other members of the UPA's "Black Studies Research Sources" collection are "Part 2: The Papers of Robert F. Williams," Timothy B. Tyson,
Professor of Afro-American Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Editorial Advisor, "Part 3: Papers of the Revolutionary Action Movement, 1963?-1996", Muhammad Ahmad, Ernie Allen, Jr., and John H. Bracey, Jr., Editorial Advisers, and "Part 4: League of Revolutionary Black Workers." Click here for a complete list of Lexis-Nexis Microfilm Collection Guides for African American studies.

The Black Scholar - Contributing and Advisory Editors

Current as of Spring 2010

The Black Scholar Issue List

November 1969 Through the Last Published Issue

Information on missing issues will be added as it becomes available.
  • Vol. 1, No. 1: Inaugural Issue, Nov 1969
    Vol. 1, No. 2: Black Politics, Dec 1969
    Vol. 2, No. 3: Black Soldier, Nov 1970
    Vol. 2, No. 4: Black Church, Dec 1970
    Vol. 2, No. 6: Pan-Africanism I, Feb 1971
    Vol. 2, No. 10: Black Male, Jun 1971
    Vol. 3, No. 1: Young Black Writers, Sep 1971
    Vol. 3, No. 3: Black Athlete, Nov. 1971
    Vol. 3, No. 4: Black Woman, Dec 1971
    Vol. 3, No. 5: Black Colony African Struggle, Jan 1972
    Vol. 3, No. 6: Black Colony USA, Feb 1972
    Vol. 3, No. 9: Black Battles, May 1972
    Vol. 4, No. 1: Black Politics, Sep 1972
    Vol. 4, No. 2: Black Prisoner II, Oct 1972
    Vol. 4, No. 4: Black Bourgeoisie, Jan 1973
    Vol. 4, No. 5: Pan Africanism Caribbean, Feb 1973
    Vol. 5, No. 3: The Movement, Nov 1973
    Vol. 5, No. 6: Black Science, May 1974
    Vol. 5, No. 7: African Liberation, Apr 1974
    Vol. 5, No. 8: Black Health, May 1974
    Vol. 5, No. 9: Black Family, Jun 74
    Vol. 5, No. 10: 6th Pan-African Congress, Aug 1974
    Vol. 6, No. 1: Black Education, Sep 1974
    Vol. 6, No. 2: Black Politics 1974, Oct 1974
    Vol. 6, No. 3: Black Media II, Nov 1974
    Vol. 6, No. 4: Black Community, Dec 1974
    Vol. 6, No. 6: Black Woman 1975, Mar 1975
    Vol. 6, No. 8: Third World Politics, May 1975
    Vol. 6, No. 9: Arts and Literature, Jun 1975
    Vol. 7, No. 1: Diaspora, Sep 1975
    Vol. 7, No. 2: Black Politics, Oct 1975
    Vol. 7, No. 3: Crisis in the Cities, Nov 1975
    Vol. 7, No. 6: Black Fundraising, Mar 1976
    Vol. 7, No. 8: Black Films, May 1976
    Vol. 7, No. 9: The Third World, Jun 1976
    Vol. 7, No. 10: Black Bicentennial, Aug 1976
    Vol. 8, No. 1: Southern Africa, Sep 1976
    Vol. 8, No. 2: South Africa: The Struggle Continues, Nov 1976
    Vol. 8, No. 3: Non-Aligned Movement, Dec 1976
    Vol. 8, No. 4: Black Politics, Jan 1977
    Vol. 8, No. 7: Black South, May 1977
    Vol. 8, No. 8-10: Report from Cuba, Summer 1977
    Vol. 9, No. 1: Black Labor, Sep 1977
    Vol. 9, No. 2: Black Repression, Oct 1977
    Vol. 9, No. 3: Plastic Arts & Crafts, Nov 1977
    Vol. 9, No. 4: Funding the Black Community, Dec 1977
    Vol. 9, No. 5: Black Africa Liberation Movements, Feb 1978
    Vol. 9, No. 6: Crisis of Resources, Mar 1978
    Vol. 9, No. 8-9: The 1960s, Jun 1978
    Vol. 9, No. 10: Black Music, Aug 1978

    Vol. 10, No. 1: African Struggle. Sept 1978
    Vol. 10, No. 2: Black Urban Community, Oct 1978
    Vol. 10, No. 5: Public Policy & Black Masses, Feb 1979
    Vol. 10, No. 6-7: Human Rights USA, Apr 1979
    Vol. 10, No. 10: Black Theatre, Jul 1979
    Vol. 11, No. 1: Black Education, Oct 1979
    Vol. 11, No. 4: Black Politics 1980, Apr 1980
    Vol. 11, No. 6: Black Struggle, Aug 1980
    Vol. 12, No. 1: Police Violence, Feb 1981
    Vol. 12, No. 5: Black Literature, Oct 1981
    Vol. 12, No. 6: Best of Black Women, Dec 1981
    Vol. 13, No. 1: Black Elderly, Feb 1982
    Vol. 13, No. 2-3: Port Chicago, Spring 1982
    Vol. 13, No. 6: Blacks & Reagan Administration, Fall 1982
    Vol. 14, No. 1: Black Community Issues, Feb 1983
    Vol. 14, No. 2: Nicaragua, Apr 1983
    Vol. 14, No. 3-4: Dialogue on Culture, Summer 1983
    Vol. 14, No. 5: Black Woman III, Oct 1983
    Vol. 14, No. 6: Blacks & Peace, Dec 1983
    Vol. 15, No. 1: Struggle for Grenada, Feb 1984
    Vol. 15, No. 3: Creating a Caribbean Culture, Jun 1984
    Vol. 15, No. 5: The Jesse Jackson Campaign, Sep-Oct 1984
    Vol. 16, No. 1: Cuban Seminar on US Minorities, Feb 1985
    Vol. 16, No. 3: Politics & Culture, Jun 1985
    Vol. 16, No. 4: Black Literature 1985, Jul-Aug 1985
    Vol. 16, No. 5: Black Political Economy 1985, Oct 1985
    Vol. 16, No. 6: US Anti-Apartheid Upsurge, Nov-Dec 1985
    Vol. 17, No. 1: Blacks & Peace, Feb 1986
    Vol. 17, No. 2: Black Woman Writer & Diaspora, Apr 1986
    Vol. 17, No. 3: Blacks and the Law, Jun 1986
    Vol. 17, No. 4: African Literature, Aug 1986
    Vol. 17, No. 5: The Black Family 1986, Oct 1986
    Vol. 17, No. 6: Black Politics, Dec 1986
    Vol. 18, No. 1: Black American Culture in the Second Renaissance, Feb 1987
    Vol. 18, No. 2: The Non-Aligned Movement, Apr 1987
    Vol. 18, No. 3: The Black Male, Jun 1987
    Vol. 18, No. 4-5: Black Culture 1987, Jul-Oct 1987
    Vol. 18, No. 6: Southern Africa: The Frontline War, Nov-Dec 1987
    Vol. 19, No. 1: Civil Rights in the Second Renaissance 1954-70, Jan-Feb 1988
    Vol. 19, No. 2: Black Politics 1988, Mar-Apr 1988
    Vol. 19, No. 3: Theory or Fact? Black Underclass, May-Jun 1988
    Vol. 19, No. 4-5: Word Within a Word, Jul-Oct 1988
    Vol. 19, No. 6: Black Education 1988, Nov-Dec 1988

    Vol. 20, No. 1: Black Politics 1989, Jan-Feb 1989
    Vol. 20, No. 2: Black Culture, Mar-Apr 1989
    Vol. 20, No. 3-4: African Culture, Summer-Fall 1989
    Vol. 20, No. 5-6: 30th Anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, Winter 1989
    Vol. 21, No. 1: Hunger in Black America, Jan-Mar 1990
    Vol. 21, No. 4: Black Cultural History 1991, Fall 1991
    Vol. 22, No. 3: Afro-American Studies in the Twenty-First Century, Summer 1992
    Vol. 22, No. 4: Black Culture 1992, Fall 1992
    Vol. 23, No. 2: Black Culture 1993, Summer 1993
    Vol. 23, No. 3-4: The Multicultural Debate, Summer-Fall 1993
    Vol. 24, No. 1: Black Cultural History 1994, Winter 1994
    Vol. 24, No. 2: Blacks & Social Policy, Spring 1994
    Vol. 24, No. 3: The New South Africa, Summer 1994
    Vol. 24, No. 4: Black Popular Movements, Fall 1994
    Vol. 25, No. 3: Affirmative Action, Summer 1995
    Vol. 25, No. 4: Million Man March, Fall 1995
    Vol. 26, No. 1: Challenge of Blackness, Winter-Spring 1996
    Vol. 26, No. 2: Black Culture 1996, Summer 1996
    Vol. 26, No. 3-4: Nation of Islam, Fall-Winter 1996
    Vol. 27, No. 1: Ebonics, Spring 1997
    Vol. 27, No. 2: Ebonics II, Summer 1997
    Vol. 27, No. 3-4: Kwame Ture/Stokely Carmichael, Fall-Winter 1997
    Vol. 28, No. 1: Black Detective Fiction, Spring 1998
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"Black Panthers" (a.k.a. "Huey!") by Agnes Varda - Part 1 of 6

Videos from YouTube are an experimental feature of this lens and often are of mediocre audio and video quality.

A 00:09:40 black and white video outtake from French filmmaker Agnes Varda's 1968 documentary about Huey Newton. The initial location is the Alameda County Courthouse at 12th and Oak Streets, Oakland, California, and later moves to the nearby Oakland Auditorium for the February 17th, 1968 Free Huey rally that featured Eldridge Cleaver, Bobby Seale, James Forman, Bob Avakian, Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown and Ron Dellums as guest speakers.

You can stream the full 31-minute capture (from VHS) of the original film and a 15-minute Black Panther Newsreel (1968) in DivX AVI format from UbuWeb Film (381MB). Downloading the segment requires installing the free DivX for Windows Codec to view the video component of the AVI file in Windows Media Player.

Agnes Varda is an award-winning director/cinematographer and a Professor of Film and Documentaries at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland.
Black Panthers (1968) part 1
by paulgallagher4 | video info

947 ratings | 366,879 views
curated content from YouTube

"Black Panthers" (a.k.a. "Huey!") by Agnes Varda - Part 2 through 6

Additional ~10-minute segments from the Agnes Varda documentary.
Black Panthers (1968) part 2
by paulgallagher4 | video info

215 ratings | 79,748 views
curated content from YouTube

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I'm the principal consultant of OakLeaf Systems and the author of 30+ books on Microsoft operating systems (Windows NT and Windows 2000 Server), databases... more »

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