The gunmen rose from the crowd and set their sights on Malcolm X. The thunder of shotgun blasts ripped through the ballroom, and Betty Shabazz turned to see her husband float backward, keel over and crash to the ballroom stage. She grabbed her children, hurling them beneath a booth and shielding them with her body while the room erupted into screams and chaos. As she lay there squeezing her family, the Betty Shabazz who was the dutiful and obedient wife of the Civil Rights Movement's most feared leader ceased to be, and the woman who emerged would become one of the greatest heroines of our day. Betty Shabazz, Surviving Malcolm X is the first major biography of Dr. Betty Shabazz, the unsung and controversial champion of the Civil Rights era. From her early marriage to black liberation's raging voice through her evolution into a powerful and outspoken African-American leader, Betty Shabazz was in constant struggle to bring freedom and justice to her people. Yet, at times her greatest fight was to struggle through tragedy and hold on to her faith amidst the stereotypes forced on her by a culture of racism and the very people she was trying to liberate. To read Betty Shabazz, Surviving Malcolm X is to experience this remarkable life. With eloquent and intimate prose, Russell J. Rickford puts you on the scene as a young Betty Sanders is taken in by foster parents after a troubled childhood. You are there as Malcolm X comes home from a hard day of railing against oppression to hug his children, dote on his wife and laugh. You dive under the table at the Audubon Ballroom as bullets strike Malcolm down. You struggle with Betty Shabazz as she fights to raise six girls alone while earning a doctorate. You stand triumphant with her as she claims her own individuality and fights to build respect for Malcolm. And you stand watch with her daughters as Betty passes away, a victim of yet another tragedy, but this time after a life lived full. Russell J. Rickford has conducted extensive research to compile this biography, interviewing more than seventy of Betty Shabazz's family members, friends, colleagues and contemporaries as well as researching countless records and documents, including recently declassified FBI, CIA and New York Police files. This is the first complete look at the life of Betty Shabazz and a new insight into the man who was known as Malcolm X. Betty Shabazz is the story of a strong woman who faced incredible tragedy and emerged triumphant, compassionate and always full of life. In the end, it is the story of a nation torn apart by hatred learning to heal and forgive.

This biography, though it covers his early life and adulthood, focusses most prominently on Malcolm X's final years, which were largely dominated by his departure from the Nation of Islam and his conflict with Elijah Muhammad. Throughout, the author addresses a number of lingering issues, including the role of fellow prisoner John Elton Bembry in Malcolm's prison conversion; whether Malcolm decided to leave the Nation of Islam before he was suspended by Elijah Muhammad; whether he was seeking martyrdom; and the extent of the role that government agencies played in Malcolm X's assassination in 1965.

This text provides a phenomenological account of the experience of anti-black racism as described by Malcolm X. Central to this analysis is the phenomenology that emerges over the course of Malcolm’s life, which emerges through the various personal transformations that the autobiography introduces and explores. As this process unfolds, a variety of different aspects of lived-experience can be witnessed that becomes situated within the process of naming that Malcolm employs to situate the specifics of his experience. For example, the phenomenology of Malcolm’s early childhood experience, is defined by two very different competing definitions for blackness. Though Malcolm Little and his family exist or find themselves “thrown” within a social structure that employs a narrative of anti-black racism, his parents are able to provide a powerful alternative meaning for blackness that is informed by the perspective taken from the Marcus Garvey Movement of the early 1900s.When that narrative is effectively silenced given Malcolm’s separation from his family, the positive meanings for black-being-in-the-world disappear and leave Malcolm with few alternatives to this new reality. As the Autobiography moves forward, Malcolm’s experience becomes defined by the phenomenology that these overlapping narratives construct. During certain moments of this phenomenology, the negative aspects of anti-black racism seem to impose very specific challenges to Malcolm’s lived-experience that become difficult to overcome and in others, powerful alternative meanings for black-being-in-the-world are taken-up and successfully employed to address the consequences of this type of racism. Though the fact of anti-black racism is never actually defeated, Malcolm’s relationship to this process is drastically transformed over the course of his reflection.

"This is an authoritative book on a critical aspect of Malcolm X's courageous political work and thought. Connecting the struggle of Africans and African Americans for liberation to the geopolitics of the Cold War in Africa, this impressive book documents Malcolm X's passionate commitment to Pan-Africanism and black internationalism during the turbulent age of decolonization. To bring this important story to life, the authors' masterfully integrate the scholarship on the US Black freedom struggle and Africa's anticolonial nationalism. Impressive in depth and breadth, the book is lucid and analytical-a powerful testament to Malcolm X's legacy to African and African American liberation." -Olufemi Vaughan, Geoffrey Canada Professor of Africana Studies & History, Bowdoin College In the current context of the Black Lives Matter movement, this book which examines the seminal contributions of Malcolm X and his explorations of his African roots could not be timelier. The book details the significant impact of Malcolm X's legacy on Africana thought in the context of the US Black freedom movement and anticolonial nationalism in Africa in the age of decolonization. Through Malcolm X's spirited commitment to Black internationalism during these turbulent moments in world history, this book integrates the story of the US Black freedom movement with the struggle for self-determination in Africa. See www.cambriapress.com/books/9781604979244.cfm for more information. This book is in the Cambria African Studies Series (General Editor: Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin; and Associate Editor: Moses Ochonu, Vanderbilt University).

This Companion presents new perspectives on Malcolm X's life and legacy for students of American history.

An examination into the intersection of Malcolm X's Muslim spiritual life and his Christian relations Despite his association with the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X had an intimate relation with Christianity and Christians, which influenced his personal life and spirituality as well as his career. Lou Decaro's Malcolm and the Cross thoroughly explores the relation between Malcolm, the Nation of Islam, and Christianity. After revealing the religious roots of the Nation of Islam in relation to Christianity, DeCaro examines Malcolm's development and contributions as an activist, journalist, orator, and revolutionist against the backdrop of his familial religious heritage. In the process, DeCaro achieves nothing less than a radical rethinking of the way we understand Malcolm X, depicting him as a religious revolutionist whose analysis of Christianity is indispensable--particularly in an era when cultic Islam, Christianity, and traditional Islam continue to represent key factors in any discussion about racism in the United States.

Reexamines the ideology of the two most prominent leaders of the civil rights movement of the 1960s

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