Introduction

Because we have so often chosen to reduce the extraordinary democratic explosion of the post-World War Two Black freedom movement into a manageable category called civil rights, it has been difficult, usually impossible, to know what to do in our classrooms with the powerful release of creative energy which was so central to that era of transformation…. A narrow “civil rights” approach may have led many persons of every age group to miss the possibility that the study of artists and their work can be enjoyable, exciting, and fundamental to the creation of a more just and democratic society. (Vincent Harding) ¹