Black Marxism


Book Description

In this ambitious work, first published in 1983, Cedric Robinson demonstrates that efforts to understand black people's history of resistance solely through the prism of Marxist theory are incomplete and inaccurate. Marxist analyses tend to presuppose European models of history and experience that downplay the significance of black people and black communities as agents of change and resistance. Black radicalism must be linked to the traditions of Africa and the unique experiences of blacks on western continents, Robinson argues, and any analyses of African American history need to acknowledge this. To illustrate his argument, Robinson traces the emergence of Marxist ideology in Europe, the resistance by blacks in historically oppressive environments, and the influence of both of these traditions on such important twentieth-century black radical thinkers as W. E. B. Du Bois, C. L. R. James, and Richard Wright.




Black Marxism, Revised and Updated Third Edition


Book Description

In this ambitious work, first published in 1983, Cedric Robinson demonstrates that efforts to understand Black people's history of resistance solely through the prism of Marxist theory are incomplete and inaccurate. Marxist analyses tend to presuppose European models of history and experience that downplay the significance of Black people and Black communities as agents of change and resistance. Black radicalism, Robinson argues, must be linked to the traditions of Africa and the unique experiences of Blacks on Western continents, and any analyses of African American history need to acknowledge this. To illustrate his argument, Robinson traces the emergence of Marxist ideology in Europe, the resistance by Blacks in historically oppressive environments, and the influence of both of these traditions on such important twentieth-century Black radical thinkers as W. E. B. Du Bois, C. L. R. James, and Richard Wright. This revised and updated third edition includes a new preface by Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, and a new foreword by Robin D. G. Kelley.




Black Marxism


Book Description

In this ambitious work, first published in 1983, Cedric Robinson demonstrates that efforts to understand black people's history of resistance solely through the prism of Marxist theory are incomplete and inaccurate. Marxist analyses tend to presuppose European models of history and experience that downplay the significance of black people and black communities as agents of change and resistance. Black radicalism must be linked to the traditions of Africa and the unique experiences of blacks on western continents, Robinson argues, and any analyses of African American history need to acknowledge this. To illustrate his argument, Robinson traces the emergence of Marxist ideology in Europe, the resistance by blacks in historically oppressive environments, and the influence of both of these traditions on such important twentieth-century black radical thinkers as W. E. B. Du Bois, C. L. R. James, and Richard Wright.




Black Marxism, Revised and Updated Third Edition


Book Description

In this ambitious work, first published in 1983, Cedric Robinson demonstrates that efforts to understand Black people's history of resistance solely through the prism of Marxist theory are incomplete and inaccurate. Marxist analyses tend to presuppose European models of history and experience that downplay the significance of Black people and Black communities as agents of change and resistance. Black radicalism, Robinson argues, must be linked to the traditions of Africa and the unique experiences of Blacks on Western continents, and any analyses of African American history need to acknowledge this. To illustrate his argument, Robinson traces the emergence of Marxist ideology in Europe, the resistance by Blacks in historically oppressive environments, and the influence of both of these traditions on such important twentieth-century Black radical thinkers as W. E. B. Du Bois, C. L. R. James, and Richard Wright. This revised and updated third edition includes a new preface by Tiffany Willoughby-Herard, and a new foreword by Robin D. G. Kelley.







New Negro, Old Left


Book Description

Maxwell uncovers both black literature's debt to Communism and Communism's debt to black literature, reciprocal obligations first incurred during the Harlem Renaissance.




Freedom Dreams


Book Description

The 20th-anniversary edition of Kelley’s influential history of 20th-century Black radicalism, with new reflections on current movements and their impact on the author, and a foreword by poet Aja Monet First published in 2002, Freedom Dreams is a staple in the study of the Black radical tradition. Unearthing the thrilling history of grassroots movements and renegade intellectuals and artists, Kelley recovers the dreams of the future worlds Black radicals struggled to achieve. Focusing on the insights of activists, from the Revolutionary Action Movement to the insurgent poetics of Aimé and Suzanne Césaire, Kelley chronicles the quest for a homeland, the hope that communism offered, the politics of surrealism, the transformative potential of Black feminism, and the long dream of reparations for slavery and Jim Crow. In this edition, Kelley includes a new introduction reflecting on how movements of the past 20 years have expanded his own vision of freedom to include mutual care, disability justice, abolition, and decolonization, and a new epilogue exploring the visionary organizing of today’s freedom dreamers. This classic history of the power of the Black radical imagination is as timely as when it was first published.




Futures of Black Radicalism


Book Description

With racial justice struggles on the rise, a probing collection considers the past and future of Black radicalism Black rebellion has returned. Dramatic protests have risen up in scores of cities and campuses; there is renewed engagement with the history of Black radical movements and thought. Here, key intellectuals—inspired by the new movements and by the seminal work of the scholar Cedric J. Robinson—recall the powerful tradition of Black radicalism while defining new directions for the activists and thinkers it inspires. In a time when activists in Ferguson, Palestine, Baltimore, and Hong Kong immediately connect across vast distances, this book makes clear that new Black radical politics is thoroughly internationalist and redraws the links between Black resistance and anti-capitalism. Featuring the key voices in this new intellectual wave, this collection outlines one of the most vibrant areas of thought today. With contributions from Greg Burris, Jordan T. Camp, Angela Davis, Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Avery F. Gordon, Stefano Harney, Christina Heatherton, Robin D.G. Kelley, George Lipsitz, Fred Moten, Paul Ortiz, Steven Osuna, Kwame M. Phillips, Shana L. Redmond, Cedric J. Robinson, Elizabeth P. Robinson, Nikhil Pal Singh, Damien M. Sojoyner, Darryl C. Thomas, and Françoise Vergès.




Cedric Robinson


Book Description

Cedric Robinson – political theorist, historian, and activist – was one of the greatest black radical thinkers of the twentieth century. In this powerful work, the first major book to tell his story, Joshua Myers shows how Robinson’s work interrogated the foundations of western political thought, modern capitalism, and changing meanings of race. Tracing the course of Robinson’s journey from his early days as an agitator in the 1960s to his publication of such seminal works as Black Marxism, Myers frames Robinson’s mission as aiming to understand and practice opposition to “the terms of order.” In so doing, Robinson excavated the Black Radical tradition as a form of resistance that imagined that life on wholly different terms was possible. In the era of Black Lives Matter, that resistance is as necessary as ever, and Robinson’s contribution only gains in importance. This book is essential reading for anyone wanting to learn more about it.




Black Movements in America


Book Description

Cedric Robinson traces the emergence of Black political cultures in the United States from slave resistances in the 16th and 17th centuries to the civil rights movements of the present. Drawing on the historical record, he argues that Blacks have constructed both a culture of resistance and a culture of accommodation based on the radically different experiences of slaves and free Blacks.