And that’s a big part of his influence on the current iteration of the Black liberation movement. I love him for his fire and deep, unwavering love of Black people. I don’t believe he was right about everything, but he set the example of self-creation, re-definition and boldly standing in your truth.
I consider Malcolm X my first real teacher. Mychal Denzel Smith: Same thing he’s always meant. What does Malcom X mean to you now, as an adult, and what ways do you feel his philosophies and teachings are present in the current movement for Black lives? Truthout: In Chapter 1 you discuss discovering Malcom X and what he as a person and his philosophies and teachings meant to you as a child and then as a teenager.
Throughout the story of his journey, readers learn about the people, places and events that influenced Smith’s political education about issues such as racism, sexism, homophobia and politics, as he discusses Kanye West and Hurricane Katrina, his time at Hampton University, the Jena Six and Dave Chappelle. Bush and purged voter rolls.” He situates his story and life journey within the context of the United States’ history of various types of state violence inflicted on Black people. I entered high school the year of George W. I grew up the son of a career Navy man in Virginia Beach, Virginia, during the 1990s, while Bill Clinton triangulated politics, exploded the prison population, and slashed welfare. Smith writes, “I was born in 1986 in Washington, D.C., when Ronald Reagan was presiding over the early phase of the War on Drugs. He lived to tell his story, unlike the thousands who weren’t able to. Smith’s life could’ve been violently ended by white supremacy at 17, but it wasn’t. Any Black boy in 2012 could’ve been Trayvon, just like any Black boy in 1955 could’ve been Emmitt Till. Trayvon Martin didn’t get to grow up, figure out who he was, make mistakes, evolve, love, hate, fail, try again, live. The book begins with the story George Zimmerman told of what happened the night he killed Trayvon Martin, illustrating how Black boys’ and men’s deaths are justified by centuries-old beliefs about their inherent violence and criminality.
Mychal Denzel Smith has written an engaging and brilliant book about his growth and transformation as a Black man in the United States, Invisible Man, Got the Whole World Watching: A Young Black Man’s Education. Order your copy today by making a donation to Truthout! In this compelling mix of memoir and analysis, Smith questions our assumptions about race, masculinity, mental health, feminism and LGBTQ rights. Invisible Man, Got the Whole World Watching is a chronicle of Mychal Denzel Smith’s political and personal education in a country and era defined by both the presidency of Barack Obama and the state-sanctioned murders of so many Black people.
0 kommentar(er)
