Born #tdih 1868: William Edward Burghardt (W. E. B.) Du Bois, one of most important scholars of 20th century. Sociologist, historian, Pan-Africanist, author, editor; co-founder of @NAACP, leader of Niagara Movement, and editor of NAACP’s @thecrisismag. zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/web-…
"One is astonished in the study of history at the recurrence of the idea that evil must be forgotten, distorted, skimmed over. . . The difficulty, of course, with this philosophy is that . . . it paints perfect man & noble nations, but it does not tell the truth." ― W.E.B. DuBois
"The slave went free; stood a brief moment in the sun; then moved back again toward slavery." -- W. E. B. Du Bois on "Black Reconstruction in America" (1935), just reissued. Video ⬇️of talk about book by Eric Foner, @KeeangaYamahtta, & @HenryLouisGates zinnedproject.org/materials/blac…
In researching our new report "Erasing the Black Freedom Struggle: How State Standards Fail to Teach the Truth About Reconstruction,” we found many issues Du Bois challenged in his scholarship are still prevalent in state standards and textbooks. Read: teachreconstructionreport.org
"At first [the American Negro] was driven from the polls in the South by mobs and violence; and then he was openly cheated; finally by a ‘Gentlemen’s agreement’ with the North," -- @NAACP petition to UN, by W.E.B. Du Bois & others. #TeachVotingRights See⬇️ zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/appe…
"It is not Russia that threatens the U.S. so much as Mississippi…[I]nternal injustice done to one’s brothers is far more dangerous than the aggression of strangers from abroad." -- @NAACP petition to U.N., by W. E. B. Du Bois & others about lynching, segregation, and much more.
For 1900 World's Fair in Paris, "W. E. B. Du Bois’ team drew & colored, by hand, about 60 infographics — that compared things like population, property ownership, and literacy across the U.S. & rest of world”-- @KidadaEWilliams in Seizing Freedom. Listen: link.chtbl.com/uICDOgG0?sid=t…
As described in this article by @VincentIntondi, "W. E. B. Du Bois to Coretta Scott King: The Untold History of the Movement to Ban the Bomb," Du Bois was outspoken against nuclear weapons. #BHM2022 zinnedproject.org/if-we-knew-our…
"And shall we not best guide humanity by telling the truth about all this, so far as the truth is ascertainable?" -- W. E. B. Du Bois in "Black Reconstruction" #TeachTruth#TeachOutsideTextbook
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#PresidentsDay: "Nowhere in all this information is there any mention of fact that more than one in four U.S. presidents were involved in human trafficking & slavery." -- by @HowardU Prof. Clarence Lusane, "Black History of the White House" #TeachTruth ⬇️ zinnedproject.org/if-we-knew-our…
“When you sing that this country was founded on freedom, don’t forget the duet of shackles dragging against the ground my entire life.” - - @ClintSmithIII on @pbsnewshour reads a "letter to past presidents." #PresidentsDay
Clint Smith, in video above, is author of "How the Word Is Passed" -- an examination of how monuments & landmarks (incl. for U.S. presidents) represent — and misrepresent — central role of slavery in U.S. history & its legacy today.
Book info, lessons ⬇️ zinnedproject.org/materials/how-…
"I only have 30 min. so I thought I would begin with the Stone Age. Mankind has gone through the age of stone and the age of bronze, & today we live in the age of irony. . . And it goes something like this. We the American people do not want to live in a Communist state." 1/5
"The reason for this is not so much that we object to a planned economy, although many of us do. Not so much that we object to socialized medicine . . . We don’t want to live in a Communist state b/c we don’t want any gov't agency inspecting what we say, what we think.. . " 2/5
".. . the associations we have, the paintings we paint, the writings we write, the books we read, the meetings we go to, the organizations we join. . . And so in order to avoid all this we set up HUAC. And this committee in order to prevent us from experiencing this. . ." 3/5
#tdih 1990, Nelson Mandela released from prison after 27 years.
The U.S. gov't classified Mandela a terrorist.
While Mandela was in jail, U.S. corporate investment in apartheid South Africa grew, & Ronald Reagan had policy of “constructive engagement.” zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/mand…
Hundreds of thousands of people in U.S. & around the world mobilized to oppose apartheid in the 1980s. That successful movement built on decades of links between African liberation movements & activists in the U.S. Rosa Parks in photo ⬇️in D.C. & SNCC in next tweet. #TeachTruth
In March, 1966, James Forman, John Lewis, Bill Hall, Cleve Sellers, & Willie Ricks occupied 14th floor of South African Consulate to “protest the inhuman and barbaric system of apartheid by the South African government.” Read more below at @snccdigital. snccdigital.org/events/sncc-pr…
#tdih 1950 Wisc. Senator Joseph McCarthy delivered a speech in WV; he claimed to hold list of known communists (“enemies from within”) in U.S. State Dep't.
"The textbook periodization of anti-communist repression, which posits the Red Scare in years following WWI, & the 2nd Red Scare in late 1940s & early 1950s, erases the continuity & pervasiveness of anti-communist politics & policies. . ." -- ⬇️ zinnedproject.org/if-we-knew-our…
"Whenever organizers challenged the status quo — racism, sexism, capitalism, militarism, & colonialism — its defenders screamed 'communism.' [Yet] . . .it has always been about a lot more than Russian spies, a blustering senator from Wisconsin, and a blacklist in Hollywood."
Ida B. Wells was "countering the propaganda that was justifying a campaign of terrorism . . . political terrorism, not simply what you might think of as mob violence." -- @AdamSerwer in Seizing Freedom interview with @KidadaEWilliams about Black press ⬇️ zinnedproject.org/materials/seiz…
Black press should be in EVERY U.S. history course. Here are resources, starting with student-friendly (well, he was a journalist!) autobiography of Simeon Booker. Dramatic stories of risks he took to cover Black organizing & repression in South in 1950s. zinnedproject.org/materials/shoc…
Digital collection about Dr. Louis Charles Roudanez, founder of first Black daily newspaper in U.S., the New Orleans Tribune. Launched during Reconstruction. Website by great-great-grandson, an elementary school teacher. zinnedproject.org/materials/roud…
You've heard of Kent State (1970) and maybe Jackson State (1970). Did you know #tdih 1968, 28 students were injured and three killed (one a HS student) — most shot in the back by state police while involved in a peaceful protest in Orangeburg, SC? Read ⬇️ zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/oran…
The three young men murdered were Henry Smith and Samuel Hammond Jr., both SCSU students, and Delano Middleton, a local student at Wilkinson HS on his way home.
SNCC organizer Cleveland Sellers was arrested for inciting a riot & sentenced to a year in prison. He'd only been minimally involved. Later serving as president of Voorhees College, he was the only person to serve time for the massacre. @snccdigital Read: snccdigital.org/people/clevela…