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African-American Philosophy: Selected Readings
Tommy L. Lott, San Jose State University

ISBN-10: 0130846961
ISBN-13: 9780130846969

Publisher: Prentice Hall
Copyright: 2002
Format: Paper; 516 pp
Published: 12/31/2001

Suggested retail price: $73.40
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For courses in African-American Philosophy and interdisciplinary courses with units devoted to African-American thought (e.g., Legal/Justice Studies, Women's Studies, Ethnic Studies, American Studies, Critical Studies, Liberal Studies, etc.).

Text includes a selection of historical/contemporary writings on topics in African-American Philosophy. Questions including the issues of slavery and freedom, social progress, self-respect, alienation, sexuality, cultural identity, nationalism, feminism, Marxism and violence—are critically examined by prominent philosophers/non-philosophers from many disciplines.

  • Substantial extracts, and in some cases complete works—By important 19th- and 20th-century social and political thinkers.

    • Gives students the broad perspective needed to deal more adequately with issues of major concern to African Americans.

  • General topics/specific issues—General topics such as social equality and self-respect are dealt with in connection to specific issues such as slavery and racial discrimination. Emphasizes the historical significance of the arguments within very specific social and political contexts.

    • Shows students how social and political ideas are applied to policy issues and moral and social problems, and how philosophic ideas are grounded in common social experience (of all Americans), structured by gender, race and class.

  • Writings by historical and contemporary authors from many disciplines interwoven with writings by philosophers—Opens dialogue across disciplines.

    • Familiarizes instructors and students who lack a background in African-American Studies with some of the basic ideas informing African-American thought; shows students and instructors who lack a background in philosophy how the style and method of philosophical analysis is applied to questions that have a bearing on social policy regarding African-Americans.

  • Cross-disciplinary approach—Uses classic and contemporary writings to raise philosophic questions in an interdisciplinary context.

    • Allows instructors to teach interdisciplinary subjects in philosophy courses, and philosophy in interdisciplinary courses.

  • Section Introductions.

    • Gives students an overview of key topics and themes in the readings; facilitates focused reading and discussion.

  • Further reading—Listed at the end of each section.

    • Provides students and instructors with a convenient guide to important books and articles on each topic.

  • Bibliography.

    • Highlights research related more generally to African-American philosophy.

(NOTE: Each section begins with Introduction and concludes with Further Reading.)

I. ANTEBELLUM CRITICAL THOUGHT.

Howard McGary, Resistance and Slavery. David Walker, Speech at the First General Colored Association, Boston, 1828. Maria W. Stewart, An Address Delivered at the African Masonic Hall, Boston, Feb. 27, 1833. Henry Highland Garnet, An Address to the Slaves of the United States of America.

II. EMIGRATION AND DIASPORA THOUGHT.

Mary Ann Shadd Carey, A Plea for Emigration, or Notes of Canada West. Martin R. Delany, The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States `Politically Considered.' Edward Wilmot Blyden, The Call of Providence to the Descendents of Africa in America. The African Problem and the Method of Its Solution. Marcus Garvey, Race Assimilation. The True Solution of the Negro Problem. An Appeal to the Conscience of the Black Race to See Itself. The Negro's Place in World Organization. Aims and Objects of Movement for Solution of Negro Problem. Racial Ideals.

III. ASSIMILATION AND SOCIAL UPLIFT.

Frederick Douglass, An Address to the Colored People of the United States. The Present and Future of the Colored Race in America. The Lessons of the Hour. Anna Julia Cooper, Has America a Race Problem? If So, How Can It Best Be Solved? W.E.B. Du Bois, The Conservation of Races. The Talented Tenth.

Booker T. Washington, Atlanta Exposition Address. Our New Citizen. Democracy and Education. Address Delivered at Hampton Institute.

IV. CONTEMPORARY BLACK FEMINIST THOUGHT.

Patricia Hill Collins, The Social Construction of Black Feminist Thought. bell hooks, Black Women Shaping Feminist Theory. Kim Crenshaw, Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics. Audre Lorde, Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference. The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House.

V. CIVIL RIGHTS AND CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE.

Richard Wasserstrom, Rights, Human Rights and Racial Discrimination. A. Philip Randolph, A Call for Mass Action. Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Philosophy of the Student Nonviolent Movement. A Time to Break Silence. Bayard Rustin, Dr. King's Painful Dilemma.

VI. MARXISM AND SOCIAL PROGRESS.

Lucy Parsons, Address to the First Convention of the IWW. Ralph Bunche, Marxism and the `Negro Question.' W. E. B. Du Bois, Marxism and the Negro Problem. Socialism and the Negro Problem. E. Franklin Frazier, La Bourgeoisie Noire. Cornel West, Marxist Theory and the Specificity of Afro-American Oppression.

VII. REBELLION AND RADICAL THOUGHT.

Malcolm X, The Ballot or the Bullet. Jill Gordon, By Any Means Necessary: John Locke and Malcolm X on the Right to Revolution. Stokely Carmichael, Toward Black Liberation. Huey P. Newton, Functional Definition of Politics. Prison, Where Is Thy Victory? Angela Davis, Political Prisoners, Prisons and Black Liberation. Cornel West, The Paradox of the African-American Rebellion.

VIII. SOCIAL ACTIVISM RECONSIDERED.

Adolph Reed, Jr., The `Black Revolution' and the Reconstitution of Domination. Thomas Sowell, The Civil Rights Vision. Glenn C. Loury, Beyond Civil Rights. Shelby Steele, The Memory of Enemies.

IX. BLACK WOMEN WRITERS ON RAPE.

Angela Davis, Rape, Racism, and the Myth of the Black Rapist. Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Lynching, Our National Crime. Illinois Lynchings. Alice Walker, Advancing Luna and Ida B. Wells. Valerie Smith, Split Affinities: The Case of Interracial Rape. Joy James, Sexual Politics: An Anti-Lynching Crusader in Revisionist Feminism.

X. ALIENATION AND SELF-RESPECT.

Howard McGary, Alienation and the African-American Experience. Ralph J. Bunche, Race and Alienation. W.E.B. Du Bois, Separation and Self-Respect. Thomas Hill, Jr., Servility and Self-Respect. Laurence M. Thomas, Rawlsian Self-Respect and the Black Consciousness Movement. Bernard R. Boxill, Self-Respect and Protest.

"Tommy Lott has put together a genuinely novel, interesting, comprehensive, and timely text... Professor Lott has a reputation not only for creative and insightful work, but also for being a careful, precise and responsible editor in preparing texts. I have no doubt that this text will be eminently successful." — David Theo Goldberg, Arizona State University

African-American Philosophy is a topically organized collection of classical and contemporary articles on a wide range of social and political issues. Ideal for introductory courses that deal with African-American thought, this text includes an introduction along with a list of further readings after each section and a bibliography of historical and recent work in the field. Critically challenging essays are organized under sections on Antebellum Critical Thought, Emigrationist and Diaspora Thought, Assimilation and Social Uplift, Contemporary Black Feminist Thought, Civil Rights and Civil Disobedience, Marxism and Social Progress, Rebellion and Radical Thought, Social Activism Reconsidered, Black Women Writers on Rape, and Alienation and Self-Respect. The readings in this anthology represent substantial extracts, and in some cases complete works, by important nineteenth- and twentieth-century social and political thinkers.

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