The Movement

The African American Struggle for Civil Rights

Thomas C. Holt

Provides an informed and nuanced understanding of the origins, character, and objectives of the civil rights movement
Emphasizes the aspirations and initiatives of the ordinary, grassroots people involved
Re-centers our understanding of the freedom struggle around the critical concept of "movement"

The Movement

The African American Struggle for Civil Rights

Thomas C. Holt

Description

The civil rights movement was among the most important historical developments of the twentieth century and one of the most remarkable mass movements in American history. Not only did it decisively change the legal and political status of African Americans, but it prefigured as well the moral premises and methods of struggle for other historically oppressed groups seeking equal standing in American society. And, yet, despite a vague, sometimes begrudging recognition of its immense import, more often than not the movement has been misrepresented and misunderstood. For the general public, a singular moment, frozen in time at the Lincoln Memorial, sums up much of what Americans know about that remarkable decade of struggle.

In The Movement, Thomas C. Holt provides an informed and nuanced understanding of the origins, character, and objectives of the mid-twentieth-century freedom struggle, privileging the aspirations and initiatives of the ordinary, grassroots people who made it. Holt conveys a sense of these developments as a social movement, one that shaped its participants even as they shaped it. He emphasizes the conditions of possibility that enabled the heroic initiatives of the common folk over those of their more celebrated leaders. This groundbreaking book reinserts the critical concept of "movement" back into our image and understanding of the civil rights movement.

The Movement

The African American Struggle for Civil Rights

Thomas C. Holt

Acknowledgements
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations

Introduction: Carrie's Rebellion
Chapter 1: Before Montgomery
Chapter 2: Communities Organizing for Change: New South Cities
Chapter 3: Communities Organizing for Change along the New South-Old South Divide
Chapter 4: Organizing in "the American Congo": Mississippi's Freedom Summer and Its Aftermath
Chapter 5: Freedom Movements in the North and the Quest for Black Power
Chapter 6: Legacies: "Freedom is a Constant Struggle"

Notes and References
Further Readings

The Movement

The African American Struggle for Civil Rights

Thomas C. Holt

Author Information

Thomas C. Holt is James Westfall Thompson Professor Emeritus of American and African American History at the University of Chicago and the author of Children of Fire: A History of African Americans and The Problem of Race in the Twenty-First Century.

The Movement

The African American Struggle for Civil Rights

Thomas C. Holt

Reviews and Awards

"A slender but potent history of the civil rights movement... Essential for students of American history as well as activists in the ongoing struggle for civil rights for all." --Kirkus, Starred Review

"Even readers well-versed in the subject will learn from Holt's close attention to lesser-known figures, events, and organizations. This well-informed history casts the civil rights struggle in a new light."--Publishers Weekly

"A brief if full picture of the civil rights movement in America."--Library Journal

"Thomas C. Holt's The Movement is a succinct and powerful book... A skilled historian whose powers are on full display in The Movement, he knows the moments when it is best to let the participants themselves summarize the extraordinary power of their struggle."--The American Scholar

"Covering less discussed moments from America's struggle for equality, The Movement is a nuanced history that takes layered ideologies and obscured figures into account."--Foreword Reviews

"Rooted in the author's personal experience of the movement, this book is a marvelous balance between economy of expression and complexity of thought. Even those well-versed in recent movement scholarship will learn something from this engaging and challenging work. Some parts of the history are more telling than others and Holt has an unerring eye for just those parts."--Charles M. Payne, author of I've Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition and the Mississippi Freedom Struggle

"Thomas C. Holt's slim volume, The Movement: The African American Struggle for Civil Rights, achieves in just 120 pages of text a comprehensiveness that belies its length... a fascinating breakdown of the movement's phases as well as a look at the groundwork that made the successes possible... The Movement lends shape and clarity to a messy, glorious period in American history."--Washington Post