African Americans Unnoticed Essay, Research Paper

For too many years, African Americans have lived without knowing the people who have influenced their way of life. We walk around without taking the time to appreciate the people that have allowed us to go to these black colleges and universities, or the African Americans that have dedicated life their to make life better for all mankind as well as blacks.

Women as well men have gone out of their way to make life better for their future. We know that women have influenced life from the beginning of time whether the role of the women is a mother, wife, doctor, or educator. But women have not always been able to advance in society, as men have been able to. As a black women I am proud to hear of women such as Lucy Laney, who she dedicated her life to get funding for black Georgia schools. She believed that women are better teachers than men and that an educated Negro woman is what is needed to teach students of all ages. Annie Julia Cooper was an active participant in the women’s organizations in the 1980s. She believed that higher education of the black woman was too rare and did what she could so that young women like me can attend college. Fannie Barrier Williams realized that racism was a major problem, but also realized that sexism was an even greater problem in equality. For, as she said, “to be a colored woman is to be discredited, mistrusted and often meanly hated.” Through times of strife and stress she worked, sometimes successfully, to eliminate discrimination against black women.

Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. Dubois, Marcus Garvey, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr., and Stokely Carmicheal; these names when said are ones to which black people respond to, because all of these men improved social conditions for African Americans. All were part of large organized mass movement in black history. Each on of these men played a different part in influencing black America. Washington was skilled at politics. He was powerful and influential in both the black and white communities, Washington was a confidential advisor to presidents. DuBois was a public speaker who noted how America tactically sidestepped the issues of color, and how his approach of “educate and agitate” appeared to fall on deaf ears. Marcus Garvey drawing on a gift for oratory, he created “Garveyism” eventually evolved into a religion of success, inspiring millions of black people worldwide who sought relief from racism and colonialism. Malcolm X and Martin LUTHER King Jr. spoke for equal rights. With Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech, which inspired people all over the nation, and Malcolm X’s autobigraphy The Autobiography of Malcolm X, people lives were changed significantly. Which in turn has affected my life. And Stokey Carmicheal who was one of the most “charismatic figures of the Black Movement” who populated the term “Black Power.”