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Continuity and Radicalism in American Black Nationalist Thought, 1914–1929

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2009

Adam Lively
Adam Lively
Affiliation:
Adam Lively graduated from the University of Cambridge in 1985.He is currently a Clare-Mellon Fellow in the Department of Philosophy, Yale University, Box 2393, Yale Station, New Haven, Connecticut 06520. He wishes to thank Mark Kaplanoffand David Wilson for their comments on earlier drafts of this article.
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Extract

Interest in the historical phenomenon of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century American black nationalism has been inspired by the revival of nationalist modes of thought among blacks since the 1950s. Because the placing of post-Second World War Pan-Africanism or the American Black Power movement within a historical context has been seen as an urgent task, the search for a coherent tradition has carried with it the danger of distortions in the historical treatment of the earlier movements. “Traditional” nineteenth-century black nationalism was essentially a conservative movement advocating racial self-improvement through the “civilizing” influence of Anglo-Saxon values, particularly Christianity. Taking black nationalism to mean the assertion of group identity for political purposes (which need not be separatist), its nature clearly changed during the period 1914–1929 as the nature of the American black community changed. For the first time in American history there existed a sizeable number of black intellectuals and a literate audience for them; the rapid growth in the number of black newspapers and magazines reflected these facts. These intellectuals were responsive to new ideas like socialism, yet the transformation of black nationalist thought during this period did not constitute a complete break with the past. This essay attempts to illustrate continuities with the nineteenth century along with those elements of radicalism that presaged modern black nationalism.

Two discontinuities between modern and “traditional” black nationalism constitute essential reference points for the analysis of black nationalist thought during this period. The first relates to who is perceived as being the principal agent or vanguard of the nationalist movement.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of American Studies , Volume 18 , Issue 2 , August 1984 , pp. 207 - 235
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1984

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