In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s, Issue 2Harvard University Press, 1981 - 359 pages With its radical ideology and effective tactics, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) was the cutting edge of the civil rights movement during the 1960s. This sympathetic yet even-handed book records for the first time the complete story of SNCC's evolution, of its successes and its difficulties in the ongoing struggle to end white repression. At its birth, SNCC was composed of black college students who shared an ideology of moral radicalism. This ideology, with its emphasis on nonviolence, challenged Southern segregation. SNCC students were the earliest civil rights fighters of the Second Reconstruction. They conducted sit-ins at lunch counters, spearheaded the freedom rides, and organized voter registration, which shook white complacency and awakened black political consciousness. In the process, Carson shows, SNCC changed from a group that endorsed white middle-class values to one that questioned the basic assumptions of liberal ideology and raised the fist for black power. Indeed, SNCC's radical and penetrating analysis of the American power structure reached beyond the black community to help spark wider social protests of the 1960s, such as the anti-Vietnam War movement. Carson's history of SNCC goes behind the scene to determine why the group's ideological evolution was accompanied by bitter power struggles within the organization. Using interviews, transcripts of meetings, unpublished position papers, and recently released FBI documents, he reveals how a radical group is subject to enormous, often divisive pressures as it fights the difficult battle for social change. |
From inside the book
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Page 84
... federal complic- ity in southern racial oppression In May 1962 , for example , following the conviction of Bob Moses and Charles McDew on charges of disorderly conduct during the McComb protests , SNCC suggested that Attorney General ...
... federal complic- ity in southern racial oppression In May 1962 , for example , following the conviction of Bob Moses and Charles McDew on charges of disorderly conduct during the McComb protests , SNCC suggested that Attorney General ...
Page 85
... federal government . ( SNCC workers recognized that the federal government was not likely to respond to many of their appeals for assistance , yet they also knew that their requests would dramatize the situation and that such help was ...
... federal government . ( SNCC workers recognized that the federal government was not likely to respond to many of their appeals for assistance , yet they also knew that their requests would dramatize the situation and that such help was ...
Page 115
... federal policy regarding protection of civil rights workers . Instead , the federal government reacted by focusing its resources solely on the Philadelphia incident . President Johnson authorized the use of 200 navy men in the search ...
... federal policy regarding protection of civil rights workers . Instead , the federal government reacted by focusing its resources solely on the Philadelphia incident . President Johnson authorized the use of 200 navy men in the search ...
Other editions - View all
In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s, With a New ... Clayborne Carson Limited preview - 1995 |
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