Letter to James Baldwin (teaching awareness of racial injustice)

International Journal of Research, 2021

is a magnate name of the African American literature. He is often couched as the titan spokesperson of the Black community in America. He ferociously used his pen to argue and criticize the racial bigotry that grips American society and polity. His arguments and views are still deemed notably worthy in both literary and political world and are often quoted by contemporary artists, writers, activists, and politicians. He authored several books and published essays on a wide range of subjects throughout his literary life. Baldwin enunciated and sustained various protests through his realistic literature-both fictional and non-fictional. However, he ardently refused to be named as a 'protest literature author.' He has repeatedly repudiated this title along with several others like 'spokesman of the Black Community.' He vehemently refused to accept social protest novels as an appropriate literary genre. He loudly vocalized his opinions in his one of the first and intensely polemical essay "Everybody's Protest Literature." It was first published in the year 1949 and then reappeared in his collection of essays titled "Notes of a Native Son" in 1955. Baldwin offered a comprehensive and intricate critique of protest novels specifically focusing on two pioneering social protest novels of American literary history. He launches a staunch enquiry on Harriet Beecher Stowe's groundbreaking novel about slavery titled "Uncle Tom's Cabin" and Richard Wright's renowned novel named "Native Son." Baldwin shared an intimate relationship with both the literary pieces. He introduced this to his readers at the beginning of "Notes of Native Son." He deliberately informed that he like many black

Teaching Theology & Religion, 2010

This article outlines an ongoing method the author developed for seeking to enable predominantly White students in theological education (those training for authorized public ordained ministry) to engage with the central tenets of racial justice. The quest for racial justice has been an important part of the mission of the major church denominations in the United Kingdom over the past twenty years, as they have declared that "Racism is a sin." Ordained ministers are now charged with the task of seeking to lead church congregations into faithful, anti-racist forms of practice -namely, the quest for racial justice. This paper outlines the working method the author has developed in order to conscientize ministers in training for this significant task. My scholarly work in the United Kingdom straddles the divide between scholarship and ministry. I am a research fellow at the Queen's Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education and a Consultant in Black Theological Studies for the Methodist Church in Great Britain. My work is concerned with developing an educational approach to undertaking Black Theology. 1 I am interested in using the frameworks of radical, liberative education as a conduit for undertaking Black Theology, for the ultimate purposes of conscientization and Christian formation of ordinary Black people. My participative approach to undertaking Black Theology is one that seeks to use models of experiential learning, such as exercises and games, role-play and drama as an interactive means of engaging with adult learners in order that they can be impacted by, learn from, and contribute to the development of new knowledge concerning the theory and practice of Black Theology (see Reddie , 2006aReddie , 2006b. A part of that ongoing work has also included working with predominantly White ministerial students in training for the ordained ministry. This work sees me leading "racism awareness courses" for predominantly White theological or seminary students in various institutions across the country. As one of the leading Black theologians in the United Kingdom, 2 the burden of engaging with students around the issues of "race," ethnicity, and difference often falls upon me. The term "race" is in quotation marks as 1 In using the term "Black Theology," I am speaking of the specific self-named enterprise of reinterpreting the meaning of God as revealed in Jesus Christ, in light of the very real experiences, largely of struggle, oppression, and sheer hardship, of Black people (see Hopkins 1999). 2 I am the editor of the only academic Black Theology journal in the world: Black Theology: an International Journal, is published three times per year by Equinox Publishing, London. Further details can be found by going to . At the time of writing, I am also the only Black religious scholar who oversees an academic book series in the United Kingdom: I am the co-editor of Cross Cultural Theologies with Equinox. Finally, I am the convener and

2013

1. THE WILLIE LYNCH LETTER AND THE MAKING OF A SLAVE – LUSHENA BOOKS 2. SEKOU MIMS, M.Ed ., MSW – LARRY HIGGINBOTTOM, MSW, LCSW – OMAR REID, Psy.D – POST TRAUMATIC SLAVERY DISORDER – PYRAMID BUILDERS , INC; - DORCHESTER, MASSACHUSETTS – NO DATE, PROBABLY BEGINNING OF THE 21ST CENTURY 3. DR. JOY DEGRUY – POST TRAUMATIC SLAVE SYNDROME, AMERICA’S LEGACY OF ENDURING INJURY AND HEALING – UPTON PRESS – JOY DEGRUY PUBLICATIONS INC. – PORTLAND, OREGON – 2005 4. DANIEL « CHÉRI-BIBI » PARIS-CLAVEL – DOMINIQUE MISSLIN – NDH MUSIC – BEFORE REGGAE – 2013 5. GEORGE GERSCHWINN – IRA GERSCHWINN – PORGY AND BESS – 1935-1959 - DVD 6. GEORGE GERSCHWINN – IRA GERSCHWINN – PORGY AND BESS – 1935-1959 – SIMON RATTLE – CD 7. JACQUES DE CAUNA – CECILE RÉVAUGER – LA SOCIÉTÉ DES EXPLOITATIONS ESCLAVAGISTES, CARAÎBES FRANCOPHONE, ANGLOPHONE, HISPANOPHONE, REGARDS CROISÉS 8. MUSÉE D’AQUITAINE – BORDEAUX [AU XVIIIe SIÈCLE] LE COMMERCE ATLANTIQUE ET L’ESCLAVAGE – 2010 9. RICHARD WRIGHT – UNCLE TOM’S CHILDREN – 1936 10. RICHARD WRIGHT – NATIVE SON - 1940 11. RICHARD WRIGHT – BLACK BOY – 1944/45 12. JAMES BALDWIN – SONNY’S BLUES – 1957 13. JAMES BALDWIN – THE AMEN CORNER – 1954 14. JAMES BALDWIN – JUST ABOVE MY HEAD – 1979 15. JAMES BALDWIN – JUST ABOVE MY HEAD – 1979 – AN OLDER REVIEW ON AMAZON.COM March 6, 2004

Rilale-Uac, 2019

Abstract When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, it was obvious that the former slaves’ fate was at stake. But it was not possible to anticipate on any complicity between stakeholders who fought for Blacks people’s emancipation and those others who shed their blood opposing their enfranchisement, hindering the promises of the abolition of the slave trade and slavery in America. A century later, justice and equality for Blacks were still an unattainable dream. Many black authors and artists have depicted the white man’s biased attitude against the newly freed black. Yet, other black authors like Zora Neale Hurston, through her novel: Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), and James Baldwin with his essay: The Fire Next Time, have adopted a more mediate and responsible stance. For them, even if it is true that the white man’s attitude toward the emancipated blacks is suicidal, the Blacks’ daily attitudes towards the whites in the one hand, and towards their fellows African Americans in the other hand, has rather contributed in worsening the cohabitation and social interplay of the two social communities: the former master and the former slave, now full American citizen. James Baldwin’s The Fire Next time, written on the occasion of the one hundredth anniversary of emancipation, with the aim of taking the stock of Blacks’ situation in America since emancipation ratification, operates in the same vein. Key-words: Incomplete Emancipation – whites’ attitudes – cohabitation – anniversary of emancipation – warning