Radicalism at the Crossroads: African American Women Activists in the Cold War

Description

With the exception of a few iconic moments such as Rosa Parks's 1955 refusal to move to the back of a Montgomery bus, we hear little about what black women activists did prior to 1960. Perhaps this gap is due to the severe repression that radicals of any color in America faced as early as the 1930s, and into the Red Scare of the 1950s. To be radical, "and" black "and" a woman was to be forced to the margins and consequently, these women's stories have been deeply buried and all but forgotten by the general public and historians alike. In this exciting work of historical recovery, Dayo F. Gore unearths and examines a dynamic, extended community of black radical women during the early Cold War, including established Communist Party activists such as Claudia Jones, artists and writers such as Beulah Richardson, and lesser-known organizers such as Vicki Garvin and Thelma Dale. These women were part of a black left that laid much of the groundwork for both the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and later strains of black radicalism. Radicalism at the Crossroads offers a sustained and in-depth analysis of the political thought and activism of black women radicals during the Cold War period and adds a new dimension to our understanding of this tumultuous and violent time in United States history. Contents Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction 1 Forging a Community of Radical Intellectuals and Activists: Black Women, the Black Left, and the Communist Party USA in the 1930s and 1940s 2 In Defense of Black Womanhood: Race, Gender, Class, and the Politics of Interracial Solidarity, 1945–1951 3 Reframing Civil Rights Activism during the Cold War: The Rosa Lee Ingram Case, 1948–1959 4 Race and Gender at Work: From the Labor Journalism of Marvel Cooke to Vicki Garvin and the National Negro Labor Council, 1935–1956 5 From Freedom to Freedomways: Black Women Radicals and the Black Freedom Movement in the 1960s and 1970s Conclusion: Centering Black Women on the Left Notes Bibliography Index About the Author