Black nationalism

Black nationalism is a form of ethnic nationalism, advocating a racial definition (or redefinition) of national identity, as opposed to multiculturalism, which originated in the 1850's and was prominent in the 1960s and early '70s in the United States among some African Americans.

While the origins of the movement are most commonly associated with Marcus Garvey's Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) of the 1920s, Garvey was preceded and influenced by Martin Delany, Henry Sylvestre-Williams, Dr. Robert Love and Edward Wilmot Blyden. Even though the future of Africa is seen as being central to Black nationalist ambitions, some adherents to Black nationalism are intent on the eventual creation of a separate black nation by African Americans.

Black nationalists maintain and promote their identity as a people of African ancestry. With slogans similar to "Up you mighty race...you can accomplish what you will!", "Black power" and "black is beautiful," they also inculcate racial pride among people of African ancestry. Black nationalism is a complete set of beliefs emphasizing cultural, political, and economic independence for African Americans.

Background

Lewis Woodson

As Augustine and as Father of Black Nationalism

Historian Floyd Miller wrote that Woodson utilized the pen name Augustine, and suggested that Woodson was the Father of Black Nationalism. During a four year period (1837-1841), as "Augustine," Woodson wrote a series of letters that were published in the Colored American newspaper. These letters advocated initiatives independent of the benevolence of whites to create institutions, including churches, newspapers, and schools. Woodson/Augustine advocated preparation for the time when the multitudes of American slaves would gain freedom, and require social, organizational, and financial assistance. Unlike most black abolitionists, who altered positions, Woodson never advocated emigration to Africa or a slave uprising.

Marcus Garvey

Marcus Garvey urged Africans "at home and abroad" to be proud of their race, practice a doctrine of "race first" and preached the importance of "African Redemption". To this end he founded the Negro World newspaper to disseminate the UNIA's program, the Black Star Line in 1919 to provide steamship transportation, and the Negro Factories Corporation to encourage black economic independence. Garvey attracted millions of supporters and claimed eleven million members for the UNIA. Garvey set the precedent for subsequent Black nationalist thought including that of Kwame Nkrumah, Jomo Kenyatta, Nnamdi Azikiwe, the Nation of Islam and Malcolm X.

Malcolm X

During the decade between 1955 and 1965, while most black leaders worked in the civil rights movement to integrate blacks into mainstream American life, Malcolm X preached independence. He maintained that Western culture, and the Judeo-Christian religious traditions on which it is based, was inherently racist. Constantly ridiculing mainstream civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X declared that nonviolence was the "philosophy of the fool." In response to Reverend King's famous "I Have a Dream" speech, Malcolm X quipped, "While King was having a dream, the rest of us Negroes are having a nightmare." Malcolm X believed that Black people must develop their own society and ethical values, including the self-help, community-based enterprises that the Black Muslims supported. He also thought that African Americans should reject integration or cooperation with Whites. Malcolm was increasingly moving towards a political response to racism, he called for a "black revolution," which he declared would be "bloody" and would renounce any sort of "compromise" with Whites. After taking part in a Hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca), he recanted such extremist opinions in favor of mainstream Sunni Islam and socialism, and was soon after assassinated during a speech held at The Audubon Ballroom, NYC.

Frantz Fanon

While in France Frantz Fanon wrote his first book, Black Skin, White Mask, an analysis of the impact of colonial subjugation on the black psyche. This book was a very personal account of Fanon’s experience being black: as a man, an intellectual, and a party to a French education. Although Fanon wrote the book while still in France, most of his other work was written while in North Africa (in particular Algeria). It was during this time that he produced his greatest works, A Dying Colonialism and perhaps the most important work on decolonization yet written, The Wretched of the Earth. In it, Fanon lucidly analyses the role of class, race, national culture and violence in the struggle for national liberation. In this seminal work Fanon expounded his views on the liberating role of violence for the colonized, as well as the general necessity of violence in the anti-colonial struggle. Both books firmly established Fanon in the eyes of much of the Third World as the leading anti-colonial thinker of the 20th century. In 1959 he compiled his essays on Algeria in a book called L'An Cinq: De la Révolution Algérienne.

Black Power

Black Power was a political movement expressing a new racial consciousness among blacks in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s. Black Power represented both a conclusion to the decade's civil rights movement and an alternative means of combatting the racism that persisted despite the efforts of black activists during the early 1960s. The meaning of Black Power was debated vigorously while the movement was in progress. To some it represented African-Americans' insistence on racial dignity and self-reliance, which was usually interpreted as economic and political independence, as well as freedom from White authority. These themes had been advanced most forcefully in the early 1960s by Malcolm X. He argued that Blacks should focus on improving their own communities, rather than striving for complete integration, and that Blacks had a duty to retaliate against violent assaults. The publication of The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965) created further support for the idea of African-American self-determination and had a strong influence on the emerging leaders of the Black Power movement. Other interpreters of Black Power emphasized the cultural heritage of Blacks, especially the African roots of their identity. This view encouraged study and celebration of Black history and culture. In the late 1960s Black college students requested curricula in African-American studies that explored their distinctive culture and history. Still another view of Black Power called for a revolutionary political struggle to reject racism and economic exploitation in the United States and abroad, as well as colonialism. This interpretation encouraged the alliance of non-whites, including Latina/os & Chicana/os and Asians, to improve the quality of their lives.

Black Panther Party

The Black Panther Party or Black Panther Party for Self-Defense (BPP) was a militant black political organization. It was founded in Oakland, California by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale in October 1966. The BPP combined elements of Maoism and Black Nationalism, insisting that if businesses and the government did not provide for full employment, the community should take over the means of production. It promoted the development of strong Black-controlled institutions, calling for Blacks to work together to protect their rights and to improve their economic and social conditions.

The Black Panther Party saw cultural nationalism as "black racism" and preferred the slogan "All Power To The People" over the "Black Power" chant. The BPP affirmed the right of blacks to use violence to defend themselves and thus became an alternative to more moderate civil rights groups. The BPP also emphasized racial unity, criticizing the Black middle class for acting against the interests of other, less fortunate Blacks. The BPP advocated Black self-defense and restructuring American society to make it more politically, economically, and socially equal. The BPP was influenced by the charismatic Nation of Islam leader Elijah Muhammad and his disciple Malcolm X, who called on black people to defend themselves against racist attacks by "the white power structure".

Uhuru Movement

The Uhuru Movement is the largest contemporary black movement advocating Black nationalism. It was founded in the 1980's in St. Petersburg, Florida. Composed mainly of the African People's Socialist Party, the Uhuru Movement also includes other organizations based in both Africa and the United States. These organizations are in the process of establishing a broader organization called the African Socialist International.

A critical view

Critics charge that Black nationalism is simply Black supremacism in disguise, and some argue that the implication of inherent cultures or unity based on race (a central idea of Black nationalism) is itself racist.

Norm R. Allen, Jr., executive director of African Americans for Humanism, calls Black Nationalism a "strange mixture of profound thought and patent nonsense".

On the one hand, Reactionary Black Nationalists (RBNs) advocate self-love, self-respect, self-acceptance, self-help, pride, unity, and so forth - much like the right-wingers who promote "traditional family values." But - also like the holier-than-thou right-wingers - RBNs promote bigotry, intolerance, hatred, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, pseudo-science, irrationality, dogmatic historical revisionism, violence,and so forth.

Allen further criticizes black nationalists strong "attraction for hardened prisoners and ex-cons", their encouragement of black-on-black violence when black individuals or groups are branded as "Toms," traitors, or "sellouts", the blatantly sexist stance and the similarities to white supremacist ideologies:

Many RBNs routinely preach hate. Just as white supremacists have referred to blacks as "devils," so have many RBNs referred to whites. White supremacists have verbally attacked gays, as have RBNs. White supremacists embrace paranoid conspiracy theories, as do their black counterparts. RBNs and white supremacists bash white Jews and sell anti-Jewish literature.[...] Many white supremacists and RBNs consistently deny that they are preaching

hate and blame the mainstream media for misrepresenting them. (A striking exception is the NOI's Khallid Muhammad, who, according to Gates, admitted in a taped speech titled "No Love for the Other' Side," "Never will I say I am not anti-Semitic. I pray that God will kill my enemy and take him off the face of the planet.") Rather, they claim they are teaching "truth" and advocating the love of their own people, as though love of self and hatred of others are mutually exclusive positions. On the contrary, RBNs preach love of self and hatred of their enemies. (Indeed, it often seems that these

groups are motivated more by hatred of their enemies than love of their people.)

Nigerian-born professor of History and Director of the African American Studies program at the University of Montana, Tunde Adeleke, argues in his book "UnAfrican Americans: Nineteenth- Century Black Nationalists and the Civilizing Mission" that 19th-century black American nationalism embodied the racist and paternalistic values of Euro-American culture and that Black nationalist plans were not designed for the immediate benefit of Africans but to enhance their own fortunes. Adeleke further criticizes the imperial motives and the concept of a ‘civilizing mission’ operating within the Black Nationalist thought which aided in “shaping and legitimizing European imperialism of Africa”.

Although compelled to identify with and embrace Africa, these nationalists harbored strong reservations. Socialized in a Eurocentric environment, where they were imbued with negative conceptions of Africa, they approached Africa with the same paternalism and condescension that the Europeans had adopted

See also

• Harry Haywood
• Back-to-Africa movement
• Black Muslim
• Ethnic nationalism
• Black anarchism
• Pacific Movement of the Eastern World
• Black supremacy
• Pan Africanism
• Romantic nationalism
• White nationalism