Integrationism In African American Intellectual History

Slavery began in the late 16th century to early 18th century. Africans were brought to American colonies by white masters to come and work on their plantations in the South. They were treated harshly with no payments for all their hard work. In addition, they lived under harsh living conditions, and this led to their resistance against these harsh conditions. The racism towards the African Americans who were slaves was at its extreme as they did not have any rights; no civil nor political rights.

In Kiese Laymon “How to Slowly Kill yourselves and others in America” and Brent Staples “Black Men and Public Spaces” both essays deal with being an African American man but the authors respond in a different ways. At one point in history being an African American wasn’t always the easiest but two Authors shared their stories about the experiences they had which were very different. Although the color of their skin is the same and how they treated was as well both authors take different precaution’s to handle the situations they were in to persuade the audience on how to deal with the effects of racism. Both authors show their hidden message through the actions presented throughout the essays. Laymon`s casual tone and will to fight make

The person I interviewed is named Zalyn Kieu. On March 4, 2017, I went to her house is located at 1888 Homegate Dr, San Jose, Ca, 95148 to interview her. Zalyn is about eighteen years old. Zalyn was born in the United States. Both her parent are Vietnamese, and they came from Vietnam. Zalyn has dark skin, with long black hair over her shoulder. She has black eyes with long black eyelashes. Zalyn weighs over one hundred pounds and she is about five feet and three inches. Her arms and legs are quite chubby. She has thin lips, white teeth, big ears that poke out slightly. Whenever she smiles, two dimple appears on her cheek. She also has a round face, and big eyes, and a pudgy nose. Her palms are big, but her fingers are not that long.

Still between 1865 and 1876, there was a culture identity crisis for African Americans. We cannot explain the roots of African American culture without

African American Studies is a very complex subject. To confuse African American studies with black history is a common occurrence. African American studies is much deeper and more profound than just Black history alone. There are many unanswered and unasked questions among the Black American culture which causes confusion and misunderstanding in modern day society. In unit one there were many themes, concepts, and significant issues in the discipline of Africana studies. Both W.E.B Du Bois and Vivian V. Gordan touched on many concerns.

The American Negro Academy, the first Black intellectual society, started the trend of establishing Black elitist groups who valued higher education. Unlike Booker T. Washington, Crummell’s Academy taught others that the race should learn self-sufficiency, not relying on social inclusion from Whites. He understood that Whites and Blacks would probably never peacefully coincide because the “race-problem” encompassed all of American history. In fact, the growth of Black and White populations would only continue to cultivate the problem.

Both Brown and Hughes show the similarities and differences of white men and black men from two different angles and they allow the reader to compare races in different ways. They both show styles of writings that were expressed by poets of the Harlem movement.

Thesis: Even with the creation of Black Studies as an academic discipline, the culture and influence of white dependency still seem to block people of color’s mental potential, and inherently their ability to progress as a group.

Over the course of this semester, I was introduced to many people, ideas, writings, and discussions that sparked my interest and enlightened me on African American history. However, I feel like this was just the beginning of my journey of learning the history of my people, as there is still so much out there to be brought to the surface. Prior to taking this course, I was always ignorant on the topic of African American history and simply made the connection to slavery. Additionally, I was unaware of other black activist, movements, and struggles that I had the chance to witness for the first time in this class. I came to a realization of how deprived of this information I was, because other historic events have been deemed more important. A quote that stuck with me throughout the course that was made by Arthur Schomburg was, “... African history and negro history, are the missing pages of world history”.

Both the African American integrationist movement and Black Power movement had common goals such as ending racial injustice towards African Americans and advocating civil rights for African Americans in the United States. Yet, the ideologies of the two movements and how they went about accomplishing their goals was drastically different. While the integrationist movement relied on concepts such as Christian Universalism and Non-Violent Direct Action (NVDA), the Black Power movement relied on more explicit means such as direct action and mobilization with violence if necessary. In general however, it seems that both movements had well-defined overarching ideologies. For the integrationist movement, Non-Violence was the key to successful integration.

During my early years of school, I remember being taught white accomplishments and wondering if blacks and other people of color had made any significant contributions to today's world. I noticed that television consist of all white people. Throughout my research paper I hope to cover certain aspects of African American heritage. Aspects such as blacks making up the largest minority group in the United States, although Mexican-Americans are rapidly changing that. The contributions blacks have provided to our country are immeasurable. Unfortunately though rather than recognizing these contributions, white America would rather focus on oppressing and degrading these people. As a consequence American

black man fights against, constantly trying to identify himself. At the same time, black men have found approaches to detach from this narrow minded image that society has created for them including; sports, education and family. The black male struggles to gain his own identity because there is already a firm image created for them that the white man visualizes the black male and the expectations of the black male. However, it isn’t just the society that plays a role in the development of the black males identity, there is also the consideration of how black males are brought up or raised in their current lifestyle situations. For example, athletes,

The mission of the students around the country who fought for an education that would shed light on African Americans. The progress the students created is seen today in American Universities ,and also HBCUs, where (AAS)African American Studies is implemented into the curriculum. Before, the dissection the formation of AAS, it should be noted that without the sacrifice from others I undoubtedly would not be writing about AAS ,or reflecting on the significance it has created for generations so far.

Scholars have dedicated their time and attention to furthering the discipline of African American Studies and can define the field with many different definitions. Through looking at the origins and development in the study we can see how it became a legitimate academic field. As we study the writings of the African American intellect, it will fully explain the importance of the discipline. Their work will justify the study of cultural and historical experiences of Africans living in Africa or the African Diaspora. When examining the scholar’s arguments we can develop our own intellectually informed rationalization of the field of African American Studies.

Introduction to African American Studies was the class that I decided to take this summer because I am genuinely interested in learning more about the cultures and lifestyles of African Americans through out history and I want to further my knowledge beyond just learning about what was taught to me in secondary school. I do not know much about African American studies as I have not taken any courses on it or relating to it in the past but I hope that I can gain a lot of information on the topic through out this intellectual experience. I also hope to gain a better understanding of the history of Africans and African Americas and be able to dive deeper into this topic instead of just hitting the surface as I feel as though my previous experiences with this topic have covered. In just this first weeks lesson I have learned about the three great principles that characterize the “Black Intellectual Tradition” and how these three principles are used and perceived.