WEBVTT 00:01.700 --> 00:07.900 I want to begin with a very brief quote by an individual 00:07.900 --> 00:12.670 who takes up some important space towards the, 00:12.667 --> 00:16.097 towards the end of the lecture. 00:16.100 --> 00:17.600 This is by former U.S. 00:17.600 --> 00:20.000 representative Shirley Chisholm, 00:22.100 --> 00:24.170 and she says, "The emotional, 00:24.167 --> 00:28.497 sexual, and psychological stereotyping of female 00:28.500 --> 00:34.500 begins when the doctor says 'It's a girl.'" Now 00:41.067 --> 00:45.667 throughout the course, in an underlying sort of way, 00:45.667 --> 00:46.997 every now and again, we've been talking about, 00:47.000 --> 00:50.100 in a variety of different ways, 00:50.100 --> 00:53.900 gender dynamics in the American scene, 00:53.900 --> 00:57.170 whether it's the strange intermarriage--interesting 00:57.167 --> 01:00.367 choice of words--of race and, 01:00.367 --> 01:05.597 and sex and gender, when it comes to the figure of the 01:05.600 --> 01:08.800 black male rapist, or the black male brute, 01:08.800 --> 01:12.200 and white womanhood, vaunted womanhood. 01:12.200 --> 01:15.770 And certainly we've been hearing from our primary 01:15.767 --> 01:19.297 sources especially, a range of different women writers 01:19.300 --> 01:21.100 and thinkers and activists. 01:21.100 --> 01:24.000 Today I want to spend a lot of the lecture focusing on, 01:24.000 --> 01:29.800 on this particular moment in the early 1970s where you 01:29.800 --> 01:34.600 have a very modern articulation of a new black 01:34.600 --> 01:36.600 feminism. 01:39.000 --> 01:42.370 So as you've been hearing from me in the last several 01:42.367 --> 01:44.697 lectures, it almost sounds like a drumbeat, 01:44.700 --> 01:46.670 I realize, that this is a complicated area. 01:46.667 --> 01:49.797 There's a lot of strife, there's a lot of confusion. 01:49.800 --> 01:51.770 Well, the fact simply is that it, 01:51.767 --> 01:53.797 that it is, and as this lecture's covering 01:53.800 --> 01:55.770 essentially the mid-1960s up to the mid-1970s, 01:55.767 --> 02:00.167 as we get into the 1970s, there's, 02:00.167 --> 02:03.467 there's no radical change in the idea of social 02:03.467 --> 02:04.997 complication. 02:05.000 --> 02:08.470 It's a period of profound unrest in the U.S. 02:08.467 --> 02:11.067 The economic up--euphoria of the 1960s--something I 02:11.067 --> 02:12.897 didn't mention: the economy's booming. 02:12.900 --> 02:16.970 I mean, this is part of the, the angry--the anger you 02:16.967 --> 02:20.567 hear in Gil Scott-Heron, in his spoken word performance, 02:20.567 --> 02:21.897 "Whitey on the Moon." 02:21.900 --> 02:24.570 It's like, we're spending all this money sending--I 02:24.567 --> 02:27.497 mean it's expensive to pers--put a person on the 02:27.500 --> 02:29.200 moon, as it turns out. 02:29.200 --> 02:32.500 Yet in black America, we're not seeing any of this, 02:32.500 --> 02:33.800 this kind of benefit. 02:33.800 --> 02:36.800 So the sixties are a period of incredible economic 02:36.800 --> 02:39.700 prosperity for many parts of the United States. 02:39.700 --> 02:41.000 For many black urban dwellers, 02:41.000 --> 02:43.100 though, it's something quite different. 02:43.100 --> 02:44.600 When you get into the 1970s, though, 02:44.600 --> 02:47.300 the economic euphoria vanishes, 02:47.300 --> 02:49.200 and a new fiscal reality sets in that, 02:49.200 --> 02:53.900 that, that forces economists to think, 02:53.900 --> 02:55.600 to rethink old working models. 02:55.600 --> 02:57.100 You know things are supposed to act in a certain way. 02:57.100 --> 02:59.270 My goodness, they're not acting in a certain way. 02:59.267 --> 03:00.567 And they actually coined a phrase, 03:00.567 --> 03:04.097 a term for the new economic problems of the mid- and the 03:04.100 --> 03:05.100 late-1970s. 03:05.100 --> 03:07.800 That phrase is stagflation. 03:07.800 --> 03:11.400 In a stagnant economy, according to the models, 03:11.400 --> 03:13.200 means that you're not going to have inflation. 03:13.200 --> 03:16.000 In fact, you might have deflation. 03:16.000 --> 03:18.900 But you had a stagnant economy and inflation, 03:18.900 --> 03:20.800 and it's something that just hadn't happened before and 03:20.800 --> 03:22.900 it sort of defied a lot of the--of, 03:22.900 --> 03:26.000 of logic, but, you know, this is what happens when 03:26.000 --> 03:28.700 new logic models are proposed. 03:28.700 --> 03:33.400 So fiscally, the country's heading into a wreck. 03:33.400 --> 03:36.470 It's also a period of psychological trauma as far 03:36.467 --> 03:39.667 as the mythological, mythological purity of 03:39.667 --> 03:43.097 America was concerned, the atrocities of war, 03:43.100 --> 03:44.800 and there's always atrocities, 03:44.800 --> 03:46.470 but now they're being brought home for the first 03:46.467 --> 03:49.797 time via the media's close involvement in the war, 03:49.800 --> 03:51.000 with the war in Vietnam. 03:51.000 --> 03:55.170 I mean, you have cameras, what we now--what we would 03:55.167 --> 03:56.897 now call them?, embedded, you know, 03:56.900 --> 03:57.900 journalists. 03:57.900 --> 03:59.370 You had cameras in the field, 03:59.367 --> 04:04.867 you--video and film, and the images are coming back on 04:04.867 --> 04:08.997 the nightly news, something that we don't see any more, 04:09.000 --> 04:10.000 frankly. 04:10.000 --> 04:11.000 That, that has been shut down. 04:11.000 --> 04:13.400 And it's been shut down because it was very 04:13.400 --> 04:16.170 effective at spreading dismay or anxiety, 04:16.167 --> 04:19.697 what the heck we are doing over in Vietnam. 04:19.700 --> 04:22.200 Why do our young men keep coming home in body bags? 04:24.600 --> 04:26.600 So with a heightened media presence, 04:30.100 --> 04:32.200 means you can't hide the fact that America's 04:32.200 --> 04:35.270 overwhelming military power found itself almost 04:35.267 --> 04:38.097 irrelevant in the face of North Vietnamese 04:38.100 --> 04:40.100 determination. 04:41.600 --> 04:44.000 The war is not going well, as you get into the late 04:44.000 --> 04:47.100 sixties and into the early seventies. 04:47.100 --> 04:49.600 You have a sitting president in the late sixties, 04:49.600 --> 04:53.500 LBJ, who declines to run for a second term in office. 04:53.500 --> 04:54.970 A shocking moment. 04:54.967 --> 04:58.497 You know, he took over when JFK was assassinated, 04:58.500 --> 05:02.400 won a first election, then had a chance to run for a 05:02.400 --> 05:04.400 second, and said no. 05:06.300 --> 05:10.000 The Republican Party, under Nixon, 05:10.000 --> 05:11.770 takes control with a pledge to the South, 05:11.767 --> 05:14.367 I mentioned in a previous lecture, 05:14.367 --> 05:17.697 with Strom Thurmond, that is going to ignore the civil 05:17.700 --> 05:19.000 rights gains of the preceding decade. 05:19.000 --> 05:20.900 Nixon runs on a law and order campaign. 05:20.900 --> 05:25.700 Actually, a few of you came to Kathleen Cleaver's 05:25.700 --> 05:28.100 presentation last night, and she said something that's 05:28.100 --> 05:29.770 really quite striking, and I've heard it from many 05:29.767 --> 05:30.797 different people. 05:30.800 --> 05:33.370 And you'll, you'll hear it from me in a different way I 05:33.367 --> 05:34.997 suppose later on in this course in the time that 05:35.000 --> 05:38.800 remains, is that you look for those people like 05:38.800 --> 05:41.900 Kathleen Cleaver who were adults during Nixon's era. 05:41.900 --> 05:44.070 This is like, you know, the country can't get any worse 05:44.067 --> 05:46.697 as far as presidential leadership. 05:46.700 --> 05:49.470 But you look back at--[Student sneezes] Bless 05:49.467 --> 05:53.497 you--at the, at, at the Republican party politics 05:53.500 --> 05:58.870 under, under Nixon, and the country has shifted very far 05:58.867 --> 06:00.167 to the right, the arbitrary right, 06:00.167 --> 06:03.197 in terms of being much more conservative politically, 06:03.200 --> 06:05.500 that from the standpoint of many different political 06:05.500 --> 06:11.500 projects, Nixon is sounding really quite progressive in 06:11.500 --> 06:14.600 many areas compared to--you know, 06:14.600 --> 06:18.900 it doesn't matter who's in the office, 06:18.900 --> 06:20.800 Republican or Democrat. 06:20.800 --> 06:24.200 Clinton was a conservative Republican and Obama's a 06:24.200 --> 06:25.200 moderate--excuse me. 06:25.200 --> 06:27.900 What did I say?--conservative Democrat 06:27.900 --> 06:28.900 and, and Obama's a moderate Democrat, 06:28.900 --> 06:29.900 and Nixon on many issues, they had--they were on the 06:29.900 --> 06:32.500 same page, where Nixon was a little bit more liberal. 06:32.500 --> 06:34.500 It's, it's a weird kind of thing to say, 06:34.500 --> 06:35.900 but this is the record. 06:35.900 --> 06:38.000 In any event, Nixon's now in office, 06:38.000 --> 06:40.200 running under a law and order campaign, 06:40.200 --> 06:42.500 having gotten into office under, 06:42.500 --> 06:44.470 running, running underneath a law and order campaign. 06:44.467 --> 06:49.897 But he's not in office that long when the country's 06:49.900 --> 06:54.800 growing skepticism about its elected officials 06:54.800 --> 06:57.600 intensifies, once it learns about the break-in, 06:57.600 --> 07:00.600 break-ins at the Watergate, and the extent to which the 07:00.600 --> 07:02.600 cover ups were orchestrated by the White House, 07:02.600 --> 07:03.770 by Nixon himself. 07:03.767 --> 07:06.567 It's actually funny. 07:06.567 --> 07:08.967 This is around--I was born in 1967, 07:08.967 --> 07:12.497 and I remember watching live TV and thinking--well, 07:12.500 --> 07:13.700 I thought Nixon was the guy on the, 07:13.700 --> 07:14.700 on the dime. 07:14.700 --> 07:15.800 I didn't realize it was a different President, 07:15.800 --> 07:18.200 but the guy that looked like the guy on the dime, 07:18.200 --> 07:19.900 I knew he was in trouble. 07:19.900 --> 07:22.000 I didn't know what he did, and it was too much for my 07:22.000 --> 07:24.400 small brain to accommodate at the time, 07:24.400 --> 07:26.600 but my first political memory is of the impeachment 07:26.600 --> 07:29.770 hearings, dealing with, with Richard Nixon. 07:29.767 --> 07:31.197 People were fixated on the TV, 07:31.200 --> 07:35.500 what is the Congress going to do? 07:35.500 --> 07:37.270 So growing out of this moment, 07:37.267 --> 07:38.967 we're talking here the early 1970s, 07:38.967 --> 07:43.597 the economy begins to tank, the military is humiliated, 07:43.600 --> 07:45.700 the political process becomes tainted at the 07:45.700 --> 07:47.500 highest levels and the country's, 07:47.500 --> 07:49.770 in a sense, is lost. 07:49.767 --> 07:52.897 Now many African Americans felt for a very long time 07:52.900 --> 07:54.500 that the country's innocence has, 07:54.500 --> 07:56.970 had been lost long before the 1970s. 07:56.967 --> 07:59.667 Black women in particular had an acute sense of 07:59.667 --> 08:02.067 disdain at the country's pronouncements about 08:02.067 --> 08:04.797 equality before the law and then the promise of the 08:04.800 --> 08:05.800 civil rights movement. 08:05.800 --> 08:08.000 Black women suffer from what they called double jeopardy, 08:08.000 --> 08:10.370 being black and being female. 08:10.367 --> 08:13.097 Citizenship twice denied. 08:13.100 --> 08:16.670 For too long, freedom was equated with, 08:16.667 --> 08:21.097 in as far as the African American community is 08:21.100 --> 08:22.300 concerned, is equated with black manhood and the 08:22.300 --> 08:25.200 freedom of blacks, with the redemption of black 08:25.200 --> 08:26.700 masculinity. 08:26.700 --> 08:29.700 If we can help our brothers, then we'll all be free. 08:29.700 --> 08:34.900 Elaine Brown becomes the leader of the Black Panther 08:34.900 --> 08:37.970 Party in the early 1970s, once the founding leadership 08:37.967 --> 08:40.997 is either jailed, kicked out, 08:41.000 --> 08:43.300 or in exile. 08:43.300 --> 08:46.700 Elaine Brown recalled an organizational meeting when 08:46.700 --> 08:49.700 she and other women were forced to wait to eat until 08:49.700 --> 08:51.700 the men were served food for which they all had 08:51.700 --> 08:54.100 contributed. 08:54.100 --> 08:55.800 The eth--ethos of the time was that, 08:55.800 --> 08:58.470 quote, this is Elaine Brown speaking here, 08:58.467 --> 09:00.597 "Sisters do not challenge brothers. 09:00.600 --> 09:02.900 Sisters stood behind their black men, 09:02.900 --> 09:05.000 supported their men, and respected them." 09:07.367 --> 09:09.767 So even in a vanguard organization like the Black 09:09.767 --> 09:12.397 Panthers, a group that called for political and 09:12.400 --> 09:15.900 economic reorientation in American life and values, 09:15.900 --> 09:17.900 good, old-fashioned sexism is alive and well. 09:19.967 --> 09:23.297 Sexism of course is nothing new to the American scene. 09:23.300 --> 09:25.500 What was new was a rising articulation of modern 09:25.500 --> 09:28.600 feminism that is built upon the emotional power of the 09:28.600 --> 09:30.500 civil rights movement. 09:30.500 --> 09:32.600 I imagine you've heard it many times before that you 09:32.600 --> 09:37.270 look at the great changes in women's politics, 09:37.267 --> 09:39.197 Chicano, Lat--Latino politics, 09:39.200 --> 09:42.000 Asian America politics, LGBTQ politics, 09:42.000 --> 09:47.900 they're growing out of the organizational skills really 09:47.900 --> 09:51.800 mastered by civil rights activists, 09:51.800 --> 09:53.400 women's, women's movement being the most, 09:53.400 --> 09:55.800 the earliest sort of, quote, other movement, 09:55.800 --> 09:59.600 building upon models of the civil rights movement with 09:59.600 --> 10:01.300 great success. 10:01.300 --> 10:06.500 In 1963, Betty Friedan published The Feminine 10:06.500 --> 10:07.600 Mystique. 10:07.600 --> 10:11.270 It became a tremendously important book, 10:11.267 --> 10:13.897 and it was essentially about how to get white, 10:13.900 --> 10:16.270 middle-class women out of the home and into the 10:16.267 --> 10:18.267 workplace. 10:19.800 --> 10:21.400 Without diminishing the importance of the book, 10:21.400 --> 10:23.600 it's, it's a landmark book. 10:23.600 --> 10:25.370 For black women, the book seemed, 10:25.367 --> 10:27.397 from sort of an argumentative standpoint, 10:27.400 --> 10:30.000 largely irrelevant, because black women had always been 10:30.000 --> 10:33.400 out of the home, in someone else's home actually, 10:33.400 --> 10:35.500 often as domestics. 10:35.500 --> 10:37.570 But they didn't have the leisure and the opportunity 10:37.567 --> 10:42.097 to be at home in a way that white middle-class women 10:42.100 --> 10:43.100 did. 10:43.100 --> 10:45.100 It's from an economic standpoint. 10:46.800 --> 10:49.670 So The Feminine Mys--Mystique is one of the 10:49.667 --> 10:53.397 first volleys of what will become sort of modern 10:53.400 --> 10:55.400 feminist movement, and right at the very beginning, 10:55.400 --> 10:56.970 black women are wondering, "Well where--How does this 10:56.967 --> 10:58.397 book apply to my experience?" 10:58.400 --> 11:02.300 A couple of years later in 1965, 11:02.300 --> 11:05.770 black women and their sense of being ignored by major 11:05.767 --> 11:11.767 currents in American society are turned on its head in a 11:11.767 --> 11:14.367 weird way when they find themselves with the 11:14.367 --> 11:16.497 spotlight turned on them. 11:16.500 --> 11:18.370 Black women used to being ignored, 11:18.367 --> 11:19.897 and now the spotlight's on them, 11:19.900 --> 11:21.270 only this time they're not being blamed--only this time 11:21.267 --> 11:26.097 they're being blamed, excuse me, 11:26.100 --> 11:28.500 for black America's failures. 11:28.500 --> 11:30.770 At that moment, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, 11:30.767 --> 11:35.367 future senator, then part of the Department of Labor, 11:35.367 --> 11:38.497 published a report called The Negro Family: The Case 11:38.500 --> 11:39.500 for National Action. 11:39.500 --> 11:43.470 The report had charted black life in the United States. 11:43.467 --> 11:45.097 It spoke about the economic, political, 11:45.100 --> 11:49.170 and social deprivations that grew out of slavery and 11:49.167 --> 11:51.067 explored how being a disadvantaged minority 11:51.067 --> 11:54.867 affected the black family structure. 11:54.867 --> 11:57.397 Today, it's a tremendously important report, 11:57.400 --> 11:59.800 and it sets welfare policy standards for the next 11:59.800 --> 12:01.470 generation. 12:01.467 --> 12:03.397 I want to reduce the report to its simplest and most 12:03.400 --> 12:05.800 controversial essence. 12:05.800 --> 12:07.900 Although Moynihan lamented it, 12:07.900 --> 12:10.270 he said he felt that, he felt that there was nothing, 12:10.267 --> 12:13.067 nothing else to do but conclude that blacks were 12:13.067 --> 12:15.197 caught in a, quote, "tangle of pathology." 12:15.200 --> 12:17.800 It's an important phrase. 12:17.800 --> 12:20.670 This tangle, moreover, was a result of women-headed 12:20.667 --> 12:23.697 households in black America. 12:23.700 --> 12:26.770 To illustrate this logic, I'm going to quote from the 12:26.767 --> 12:30.397 text, and I want you to listen here for the very 12:30.400 --> 12:32.800 clear investment in the norm of patriarchy here. 12:35.200 --> 12:38.600 Moynihan writes: "That the Negro American has survived 12:38.600 --> 12:42.200 at all is extraordinary--a lesser people might simply 12:42.200 --> 12:45.100 have died out, as indeed others have. 12:45.100 --> 12:48.100 That the Negro community has not only survived, 12:48.100 --> 12:50.170 but in this political generation has entered 12:50.167 --> 12:51.997 national affairs as a moderate, 12:52.000 --> 12:54.770 humane, and constructive national force is the 12:54.767 --> 12:57.197 highest testament to the healing powers of the 12:57.200 --> 12:59.770 democratic ideal and the creative vitality of the 12:59.767 --> 13:02.297 negro people. 13:02.300 --> 13:05.300 But it may not be supposed that the Negro American 13:05.300 --> 13:07.600 community has not paid a fearful price for the 13:07.600 --> 13:10.300 incredible mistreatment to which it has been subjected 13:10.300 --> 13:12.700 over the past three centuries. 13:12.700 --> 13:15.200 In essence, the Negro community has been forced 13:15.200 --> 13:17.500 into a matriarchal structure which, 13:17.500 --> 13:19.470 because it is so out of line with the rest of the 13:19.467 --> 13:22.867 American society, seriously retards the progress of the 13:22.867 --> 13:26.197 group as a whole, and imposes a crushing burden on 13:26.200 --> 13:28.400 the Negro male and, in consequence, 13:28.400 --> 13:32.370 on a great many Negro women as well. 13:32.367 --> 13:34.667 There is, presumably, no special place--no, 13:34.667 --> 13:37.767 excuse me, no special reason why a society in which males 13:37.767 --> 13:39.897 are dominant in family relationships is to be 13:39.900 --> 13:42.700 preferred to a matriarchal arrangement. 13:42.700 --> 13:45.270 However, it is clearly a disadvantage for a minority 13:45.267 --> 13:47.997 group to be operating on one principle, 13:48.000 --> 13:49.970 while the great majority of the population, 13:49.967 --> 13:52.197 and the one with the most advantages to begin with, 13:52.200 --> 13:54.700 is operating on another. 13:54.700 --> 13:57.300 This is the present situation of the Negro. 13:57.300 --> 14:00.400 Ours is a society which presumes male leadership in 14:00.400 --> 14:02.270 private and public affairs. 14:02.267 --> 14:05.197 The arrangements of society facilitate such leadership 14:05.200 --> 14:06.600 and reward it. 14:06.600 --> 14:09.700 A subculture, such as that of the Negro American, 14:09.700 --> 14:12.200 in which this is not--in which this is not the 14:12.200 --> 14:15.900 pattern, is placed at a distinct disadvantage. 14:15.900 --> 14:17.600 Here an earlier word of caution is--should, 14:17.600 --> 14:19.270 should be repeated. 14:19.267 --> 14:22.567 There is much evidence that a considerable amount--There 14:22.567 --> 14:24.667 is much evidence that a considerable number of Negro 14:24.667 --> 14:26.767 families have managed to break out of the tangle of 14:26.767 --> 14:29.497 pathology and to establish themselves as stable, 14:29.500 --> 14:31.900 effective units, living according to patterns of 14:31.900 --> 14:33.900 American society in general." 14:36.700 --> 14:41.500 This is one excerpt from a much larger study, 14:41.500 --> 14:47.570 of course, and this is coming from an old-fashioned 14:47.567 --> 14:51.297 Democrat, an old--a, a great liberal in the American 14:51.300 --> 14:55.070 tradition, lamenting the destruction of the black 14:55.067 --> 14:58.867 family, pointing to the fact that its matriarchal 14:58.867 --> 15:00.797 structure, the women-headed households, 15:00.800 --> 15:04.300 is the real reason behind, behind blacks' inability to 15:04.300 --> 15:06.300 have successful family units, 15:06.300 --> 15:09.170 because it's so out of line with the national norm of 15:09.167 --> 15:11.167 male-headed households. 15:13.067 --> 15:15.797 You know, it's great that blacks are so--have such 15:15.800 --> 15:17.800 strong backbones, they've been able to survive so much 15:17.800 --> 15:20.770 degradation, but we've got to find a way to solve this 15:20.767 --> 15:21.897 problem. 15:21.900 --> 15:23.900 It is a call for national action, 15:23.900 --> 15:26.970 which is the subtitle, The Case for National Action, 15:26.967 --> 15:28.597 the subtitle of the report. 15:28.600 --> 15:30.500 We need to solve the problem of the structure of the 15:30.500 --> 15:32.500 black family. 15:34.200 --> 15:38.200 Black Americans are outraged by the report and its claim 15:38.200 --> 15:40.200 of an almost organic dysfunctionalism. 15:42.200 --> 15:45.670 This is not an anger that sought to deny the very 15:45.667 --> 15:49.267 obvious reality of poverty in the black community. 15:49.267 --> 15:52.197 No one could deny that. 15:52.200 --> 15:55.270 And also this anger is not a direct manifestation of the 15:55.267 --> 15:57.367 failure of Johnson's Great Society, 15:57.367 --> 16:00.297 and King's civil rights strategies to address 16:00.300 --> 16:02.300 abiding problems of poverty. 16:03.800 --> 16:06.000 People recognize the efforts that are being made in these 16:06.000 --> 16:08.970 regards. 16:08.967 --> 16:11.867 The anger is really a result of being considered a 16:11.867 --> 16:14.997 problem that America, and especially white America, 16:15.000 --> 16:16.000 had to solve. 16:16.000 --> 16:17.970 I mean think of this moment. 16:17.967 --> 16:19.297 This is the moment we're talking about. 16:19.300 --> 16:22.070 Moynihan's report comes out in '65. 16:22.067 --> 16:23.897 Stokely Carmichael is talking about Black Power in 16:23.900 --> 16:27.300 '66, and while Stokely Carmichael and, 16:27.300 --> 16:29.570 and his fellow travelers are a minority within black 16:29.567 --> 16:33.097 America, they're still getting a lot of attention, 16:33.100 --> 16:34.770 far more attention than their actual numbers would 16:34.767 --> 16:36.597 suggest. 16:36.600 --> 16:39.970 And to suggest--to hear then from an important figure in 16:39.967 --> 16:42.097 the federal government, saying, 16:42.100 --> 16:43.970 you know, "White Americans really have to solve this 16:43.967 --> 16:44.967 problem for black Americans. 16:44.967 --> 16:49.467 We need to find a solution," and sort of saying, 16:49.467 --> 16:50.467 you know, "It's really too bad, 16:50.467 --> 16:52.997 we've also been part of the problem, 16:53.000 --> 16:57.270 but we really can't address that issue. 16:57.267 --> 17:01.367 Let's try to fix this black family, 17:01.367 --> 17:04.397 just outraged black, black Americans. 17:04.400 --> 17:08.800 So according to Moynihan, blacks are a problem that 17:08.800 --> 17:11.270 white America had to resolve. 17:11.267 --> 17:12.767 Now you may or may not be surprised, 17:12.767 --> 17:14.997 as I've talked in this course about connections to 17:15.000 --> 17:18.270 events decades earlier and the way in which things 17:18.267 --> 17:19.697 don't change at times. 17:19.700 --> 17:20.900 You may not be surprised that W. 17:20.900 --> 17:21.900 E. 17:21.900 --> 17:22.900 B. 17:22.900 --> 17:26.100 Du Bois, having just passed away two years earlier, 17:26.100 --> 17:30.100 said as much the same thing in 1903, 17:30.100 --> 17:32.200 when he offered the following words in his 17:32.200 --> 17:34.000 landmark book, The Souls of Black Folk. 17:34.000 --> 17:38.400 And Du Bois said, "Between me and the other world there 17:38.400 --> 17:42.200 is an ever unasked question: unasked by some through 17:42.200 --> 17:45.000 feelings of delicacy; by others through the 17:45.000 --> 17:47.400 difficulty of rightly framing it. 17:47.400 --> 17:50.370 All, nevertheless, flutter around it. 17:50.367 --> 17:52.797 They approach me in a half-hesitant sort of way, 17:52.800 --> 17:54.970 eye me curiously or compassionately, 17:54.967 --> 17:56.897 and then, instead of saying directly, 17:56.900 --> 17:59.700 'How does it feel to be a problem?' they say, 17:59.700 --> 18:02.500 'I know an excellent colored man in my town; 18:02.500 --> 18:04.970 or, 'Do not these southern outrages make you--make your 18:04.967 --> 18:08.167 blood boil?' At these I smile, 18:08.167 --> 18:11.697 or am interested, or reduce the boiling to a simmer, 18:11.700 --> 18:13.970 as the occasion may require. 18:13.967 --> 18:17.097 To the real question, 'How does it feel to be a 18:17.100 --> 18:19.800 problem?' I answer seldom a word." 18:21.900 --> 18:23.800 This is a different age, 1965. 18:23.800 --> 18:27.270 This is a different age than Du Bois's in 1903. 18:27.267 --> 18:31.097 And instead of silence, black women begin to be 18:31.100 --> 18:33.300 heard on these kinds of issues that Moynihan's 18:33.300 --> 18:34.400 raising. 18:34.400 --> 18:36.200 Now please note, I'm not saying they begin to speak 18:36.200 --> 18:37.200 up. 18:37.200 --> 18:39.300 They're beginning to be heard. 18:41.700 --> 18:43.700 In the wake of the Moynihan Report, 18:45.900 --> 18:47.870 groups across the country, individuals and groups, 18:47.867 --> 18:49.197 galvanize into action. 18:49.200 --> 18:52.600 There's a huge amount of scholarship published in the 18:52.600 --> 18:54.670 wake of the Moynihan Report, in response to the Moynihan 18:54.667 --> 18:56.897 Report, dealing with the sociology of the black 18:56.900 --> 19:00.400 family and, sort of, so-called black sociology. 19:00.400 --> 19:05.970 But on the activist front, people are outraged by sort 19:05.967 --> 19:10.097 of the blinders on Daniel Patrick Moynihan's opinions 19:10.100 --> 19:13.500 or thoughts or analyses, start forming groups of 19:13.500 --> 19:17.700 their own, and one of the key players in this process 19:17.700 --> 19:19.170 was a woman named Johnnie Tillman, 19:19.167 --> 19:23.867 a black woman, who had been on welfare herself, 19:23.867 --> 19:25.897 who helped organize the National Welfare 19:25.900 --> 19:27.970 Organization, the NWRO. 19:27.967 --> 19:33.967 Tillman becomes one of the galvanizing figures of the 19:37.000 --> 19:40.100 NWRO, and really one of its spokespersons. 19:40.100 --> 19:47.000 Tillman defined poverty as the defining element in the 19:47.000 --> 19:48.070 lives of black women. 19:48.067 --> 19:49.067 Through her leadership at the NWRO, 19:49.067 --> 19:53.797 she pursued a practical agenda that called for 19:53.800 --> 19:58.000 decent wages, access to education and job training, 19:58.000 --> 20:02.800 medical care for women children, 20:02.800 --> 20:05.200 and children's daycare. 20:05.200 --> 20:07.300 They want decent wages, access to education and job 20:07.300 --> 20:08.970 training, medical care for women and children, 20:08.967 --> 20:10.197 and children's daycare. 20:10.200 --> 20:11.870 And the NR--excuse me, the NWRO also called for an end 20:11.867 --> 20:17.297 to abusive and degrading practices of welfare case 20:17.300 --> 20:20.670 workers who would, for example, 20:20.667 --> 20:24.667 show up at a welfare recipient's home at 20:24.667 --> 20:27.597 midnight, looking for evidence of other means of 20:27.600 --> 20:28.800 support. 20:28.800 --> 20:31.870 And most often, quote, "other means of support, 20:31.867 --> 20:33.597 meant that an adult male was present. 20:33.600 --> 20:37.470 It was built into the structure of welfare policy 20:37.467 --> 20:41.197 of this era that suggestion--you see in 20:41.200 --> 20:43.500 Moynihan's ideology--that the norm should be 20:43.500 --> 20:46.300 patriarchal-headed family structure. 20:46.300 --> 20:49.570 That if there was a man around, 20:49.567 --> 20:56.897 it became much harder for a person on welfare to be able 20:56.900 --> 20:58.900 to claim that welfare. 21:00.900 --> 21:02.770 Tillman made her dissatisfaction known in 21:02.767 --> 21:05.897 public rallies across the country. 21:05.900 --> 21:08.900 The title of one of her more frequent talks was, 21:08.900 --> 21:12.970 was "Welfare is a Woman's Issue." 21:12.967 --> 21:15.167 It's a piece that ran in--that would eventually 21:15.167 --> 21:16.597 run in Gloria Steinem's breakout publication Ms.ΒΈ 21:16.600 --> 21:17.600 published in 1972. 21:17.600 --> 21:20.100 I want to read an excerpt from that essay, 21:20.100 --> 21:26.370 a version of which she gave at many different rallies 21:26.367 --> 21:28.197 across the country. 21:28.200 --> 21:31.500 "Welfare is a Woman's Issue, 21:31.500 --> 21:32.700 by Johnnie Tillman. 21:32.700 --> 21:33.700 "I'm a woman. 21:33.700 --> 21:35.300 I'm a black woman. 21:35.300 --> 21:37.100 I'm a poor woman. 21:37.100 --> 21:38.800 I'm a fat woman. 21:38.800 --> 21:40.700 I'm a middle-aged woman. 21:40.700 --> 21:43.270 And I'm on welfare. 21:43.267 --> 21:45.797 In this country, if you're any one of those things, 21:45.800 --> 21:48.770 you count less as a human being. 21:48.767 --> 21:51.367 If you're all those things, you don't count at all, 21:51.367 --> 21:54.097 except as a statistic. 21:54.100 --> 21:56.100 I am forty-five years old. 21:56.100 --> 21:57.400 I have raised six children. 21:57.400 --> 22:00.700 There are millions of statistics like me, 22:00.700 --> 22:03.270 some on welfare, some not. 22:03.267 --> 22:06.167 And some really poor, who don't even know they're 22:06.167 --> 22:08.467 entitled to welfare. 22:08.467 --> 22:10.497 Not all of them in black--are black, 22:10.500 --> 22:11.500 not all--not at all. 22:11.500 --> 22:14.100 In fact, the majority, about two-thirds of all poor 22:14.100 --> 22:17.500 families in the country, are white. 22:17.500 --> 22:19.900 "Welfare's like a traffic accident. 22:19.900 --> 22:22.970 It can happen to anybody, but especially it happens to 22:22.967 --> 22:24.467 women. 22:24.467 --> 22:26.997 And that's why welfare is a women's issue. 22:27.000 --> 22:29.170 For a lot of middle-class women in this country, 22:29.167 --> 22:32.397 women's liberation is a matter of concern. 22:32.400 --> 22:36.500 For women on welfare, it's a matter of survival. 22:36.500 --> 22:37.670 Survival. 22:37.667 --> 22:39.197 That's why we had to go on welfare, 22:39.200 --> 22:41.700 and that's why we can't get off welfare now, 22:41.700 --> 22:43.070 not us women. 22:43.067 --> 22:45.467 Not until we do something about liberating poor women, 22:45.467 --> 22:48.897 women in this country, because up until now, 22:48.900 --> 22:51.400 we've been raised to expect to work all our lives for 22:51.400 --> 22:54.370 nothing, because we are the worst educated, 22:54.367 --> 22:56.997 the least skilled, and the lowest paid people there 22:57.000 --> 23:00.600 are; because we have to be almost totally responsible 23:00.600 --> 23:03.900 for our children; because we are regarded by everybody as 23:03.900 --> 23:06.070 dependents. 23:06.067 --> 23:07.767 That's why we are on welfare, 23:07.767 --> 23:09.997 and that's why we stay on it. 23:10.000 --> 23:12.300 "Welfare is the most prejudiced institution in 23:12.300 --> 23:14.970 this country, even more than marriage, 23:14.967 --> 23:17.167 when it--which it tries to imitate. 23:17.167 --> 23:19.767 Let me explain that a little. 23:19.767 --> 23:21.497 Ninety-nine percent of welfare families are headed 23:21.500 --> 23:22.700 by women. 23:22.700 --> 23:24.170 There is no man around. 23:24.167 --> 23:26.367 In half the states there can't be a man around 23:26.367 --> 23:29.567 because AFDC (Aid to Families With Dependent 23:29.567 --> 23:32.597 Children) says if there is an "able-bodied" man around, 23:32.600 --> 23:34.100 then you can't be on welfare. 23:34.100 --> 23:35.300 If the kids are going to eat, 23:35.300 --> 23:39.300 and the man can't get a job, then he's got to go. 23:39.300 --> 23:42.870 Welfare is like a super-sexist marriage. 23:42.867 --> 23:45.797 You trade in a man for the man. 23:45.800 --> 23:48.000 But you can't divorce him if he treats you bad. 23:48.000 --> 23:49.400 He can divorce you, of course, 23:49.400 --> 23:51.300 cut you off anytime he wants. 23:51.300 --> 23:53.100 But in that case, he keeps the kids, 23:53.100 --> 23:54.600 not you. 23:54.600 --> 23:56.770 The man runs everything. 23:56.767 --> 23:58.997 In ordinary marriage, sex is supposed to be for your 23:59.000 --> 24:00.170 husband. 24:00.167 --> 24:03.367 On AFDC, you're not supposed to have any sex at all. 24:03.367 --> 24:05.197 You give up control of your own body. 24:05.200 --> 24:06.670 It's a condition of aid. 24:06.667 --> 24:09.397 You may even have to agree to get your tubes tied so 24:09.400 --> 24:11.970 you can never have more children just to avoid being 24:11.967 --> 24:13.767 cut off welfare. 24:13.767 --> 24:17.097 The man, the welfare system, controls your money. 24:17.100 --> 24:18.900 He tells you what to buy, what not to buy, 24:18.900 --> 24:21.500 where to buy it, and how much things cost. 24:21.500 --> 24:23.600 If things, rent, for instance, 24:23.600 --> 24:25.370 really cost more than he says they do, 24:25.367 --> 24:26.867 it's just too bad for you. 24:26.867 --> 24:28.697 He's always right. 24:28.700 --> 24:30.900 That's why Governor Ronald Reagan can get away with 24:30.900 --> 24:32.870 slandering welfare recipients, 24:32.867 --> 24:35.097 calling them, quote, "lazy parasites, 24:35.100 --> 24:37.800 "pigs at the trough," and such. 24:37.800 --> 24:39.670 We've been trained to believe that the only reason 24:39.667 --> 24:41.667 people are on welfare is because there's nothing 24:41.667 --> 24:42.767 wrong with their character. 24:42.767 --> 24:46.067 We've been trained to believe that the only reason 24:46.067 --> 24:48.997 people are on welfare is because there's something 24:49.000 --> 24:50.500 wrong with their character. 24:50.500 --> 24:53.500 If people have motivation, if people only want to work, 24:53.500 --> 24:56.300 they can, and they will be able to support themselves 24:56.300 --> 24:58.700 and their kids in decency. 24:58.700 --> 25:01.600 "The truth is a job doesn't necessarily mean an adequate 25:01.600 --> 25:02.870 income. 25:02.867 --> 25:05.497 There are some ten million jobs that now pay less than 25:05.500 --> 25:08.400 the minimum wage, and if you're a woman, 25:08.400 --> 25:10.970 you've got the best chance of getting one. 25:10.967 --> 25:12.497 Why would a forty-five-year-old woman 25:12.500 --> 25:14.900 work all day in a laundry ironing shirts at 25:14.900 --> 25:16.900 ninety-some cents an hour? 25:16.900 --> 25:19.700 Because she knows that there's some place lower she 25:19.700 --> 25:20.770 could be. 25:20.767 --> 25:22.767 She could be on welfare. 25:22.767 --> 25:26.267 Society needs women on welfare as examples to let 25:26.267 --> 25:29.297 every woman, factory workers and housewife workers alike, 25:29.300 --> 25:31.600 know what will happen if she lets up. 25:31.600 --> 25:34.000 If she's laid off, if she tries to go it alone without 25:34.000 --> 25:35.000 a man. 25:35.000 --> 25:41.670 Society needs women on welfare as examples to let 25:41.667 --> 25:44.397 every woman, factory workers and housewife workers alike, 25:44.400 --> 25:47.270 know what will happen if she lets up, 25:47.267 --> 25:49.567 if, if she's laid off, if she tries to go it alone 25:49.567 --> 25:50.997 without a man. 25:51.000 --> 25:53.470 So these ladies stay on their feet or on their knees 25:53.467 --> 25:55.267 all their lives instead of asking why they're only 25:55.267 --> 25:57.097 getting ninety-some cents an hour, 25:57.100 --> 25:59.400 instead of daring to fight and complain." 26:02.000 --> 26:08.000 Tillman carries this drumbeat with her to public 26:08.000 --> 26:10.600 rallies but also to private meetings. 26:10.600 --> 26:15.400 When, in 1968, she meets with Martin Luther King 26:15.400 --> 26:18.600 about welfare issues, she grows increasingly 26:18.600 --> 26:21.370 frustrated with King's interruptions and, 26:21.367 --> 26:24.267 in her view, evasions. 26:24.267 --> 26:25.997 She goes to King thinking, you know, 26:26.000 --> 26:28.070 "Here's a man who's really pledging himself to poverty 26:28.067 --> 26:32.297 reform or economic reform, addressing poverty, 26:32.300 --> 26:37.200 and then realizes that she's running into a stone 26:37.200 --> 26:39.100 wall in many ways. 26:39.100 --> 26:41.270 And finally Tillman says to King, 26:41.267 --> 26:43.997 "You know, Dr. King, if you don't know anything about 26:44.000 --> 26:46.670 these questions, you should say you don't know, 26:46.667 --> 26:48.667 and then we can go on with the meeting." 26:51.600 --> 26:55.100 King was, like everybody is--and it's a meaningless 26:55.100 --> 26:58.370 phrase--"a man of his time," but his own notion of 26:58.367 --> 27:02.367 patriarchal order was certainly well in place. 27:02.367 --> 27:06.597 Now Tillman and other NWRO activists linked welfare 27:06.600 --> 27:10.300 rights to civil rights, explaining that being on 27:10.300 --> 27:12.400 welfare was a necessity borne of the economic 27:12.400 --> 27:15.170 system, not of women's moral failings. 27:17.600 --> 27:19.170 So as where Moynihan and the, 27:19.167 --> 27:21.097 the Moy--the so-called Moynihan Report is talking 27:21.100 --> 27:22.100 about structures of degradation and such, 27:22.100 --> 27:30.000 it is being driven by a moral assessment of women's 27:30.000 --> 27:32.100 role in the black family. 27:32.100 --> 27:37.400 And the NWRO takes out that moral assessment and looks 27:37.400 --> 27:41.600 at the structures of economic exploitation and, 27:41.600 --> 27:43.600 and lack of education and such. 27:47.600 --> 27:52.800 Now the NWRO represents one type of political thrust of 27:52.800 --> 27:54.970 the nine--late 1960s and early 1970s. 27:54.967 --> 27:59.467 It's important that we not lose sight of this 27:59.467 --> 28:01.597 grassroots rallies and activism, 28:01.600 --> 28:03.570 calling for structural changes when it comes to 28:03.567 --> 28:07.197 welfare, but it's also important to make note of a 28:07.200 --> 28:09.400 few different milestones in the world of politics. 28:09.400 --> 28:11.700 This is the detour that leads us to Shirley 28:11.700 --> 28:12.700 Chisholm. 28:12.700 --> 28:18.700 Now I spoke earlier about the fact when the Civil 28:18.700 --> 28:23.800 Rights Act became law, that there's this moment of great 28:23.800 --> 28:25.500 excitement, but very quickly, 28:25.500 --> 28:29.200 people understood it didn't address voting issues, 28:29.200 --> 28:33.200 and this was the real next, this was the next frontier. 28:33.200 --> 28:35.770 You'll also remember that when I talked about the 28:35.767 --> 28:37.097 Voting Rights Act becoming law, 28:37.100 --> 28:40.100 of course there were riots a few days later in Los 28:40.100 --> 28:43.800 Angeles, but looking ahead a few years, 28:43.800 --> 28:44.800 towards the end of the sixites, 28:44.800 --> 28:46.400 I said you would see a radical change in the 28:46.400 --> 28:47.670 numbers of voters. 28:47.667 --> 28:49.867 The Voting Rights Act, for all of its flaws of 28:49.867 --> 28:53.267 implementation and enforcement, 28:53.267 --> 28:56.297 did bear witness to a radical shift in the number 28:56.300 --> 29:00.000 of blacks who were now able to get access to the ballot 29:00.000 --> 29:01.000 box. 29:01.000 --> 29:06.800 And you start seeing that change, 29:06.800 --> 29:09.470 or you start seeing a change based on the number of 29:09.467 --> 29:10.697 blacks who were voting. 29:10.700 --> 29:17.600 1967 was a landmark moment in terms of voting behaviors 29:17.600 --> 29:21.900 and it's actually only tangential--tangentially 29:21.900 --> 29:24.200 related, related to the Voting Rights Act, 29:24.200 --> 29:25.200 actually. 29:25.200 --> 29:27.200 The story unfolds in Cleveland. 29:29.000 --> 29:32.370 Carl Stokes, a black man, is elected mayor of the city. 29:32.367 --> 29:37.567 He'd been a local figure for some time and member of the 29:37.567 --> 29:42.267 police force, very prominent certainly. 29:42.267 --> 29:44.897 He's not the first black mayor ever, 29:44.900 --> 29:47.900 but he's the first black mayor--first black elected 29:47.900 --> 29:51.770 mayor of a major city. 29:51.767 --> 29:54.497 Now what's critically important to think about in 29:54.500 --> 30:01.800 Stokes's case is that blacks are actually the minority of 30:01.800 --> 30:03.470 the population in Cleveland. 30:03.467 --> 30:04.467 [Student sneezes] Bless you. 30:04.467 --> 30:05.467 Stokes becomes really the first successful coalition 30:05.467 --> 30:06.467 politician at that level in the country's history. 30:06.467 --> 30:10.297 He runs on a strong law and order campaign that appealed 30:10.300 --> 30:16.300 to a real segment of the population, 30:21.900 --> 30:29.500 conservative and liberal, certainly. 30:29.500 --> 30:32.900 You know, leans on his past record as a police officer. 30:35.000 --> 30:36.770 He appeals to the black community simply because 30:36.767 --> 30:38.997 here's a black man who's going to stand up and, 30:39.000 --> 30:41.170 and the assumption is he's going to speak for us, 30:41.167 --> 30:42.167 on our behalf. 30:42.167 --> 30:49.167 But he really pulls in liberal whites as well, 30:49.167 --> 30:51.797 and through a complicated sort of dance, 30:51.800 --> 30:55.600 forms a coalition, white and black voters, 30:55.600 --> 30:58.200 becomes the mayor. 30:58.200 --> 31:00.400 His campaign is watched very closely, 31:00.400 --> 31:03.170 and it becomes a model for other black mayoralty 31:03.167 --> 31:04.297 campaigns across the country. 31:04.300 --> 31:06.800 You start seeing black mayors popping out. 31:06.800 --> 31:08.300 Gary, Indiana, just around the bend, 31:08.300 --> 31:11.100 in Los Angeles, California, soon enough. 31:11.100 --> 31:15.070 You start seeing the beginnings of the era of the 31:15.067 --> 31:18.867 black mayor, in our urban landscape. 31:18.867 --> 31:23.697 And as the voting rights--the, 31:23.700 --> 31:26.900 the voting numbers start to skyrocket for African 31:26.900 --> 31:30.600 Americans, you start seeing blacks elected to offices 31:30.600 --> 31:33.170 in, in regions of the country they had not ever 31:33.167 --> 31:35.697 been elected, largely in the Southeast. 31:39.767 --> 31:42.097 Two years after Carl Stokes is elected the mayor of 31:42.100 --> 31:44.400 Cleveland, you actually have, 31:44.400 --> 31:48.600 as a result of an increasing number of blacks going to 31:48.600 --> 31:52.370 Congress, a new group formed called the Congressional 31:52.367 --> 31:54.967 Black Caucus, still alive and very well today. 31:54.967 --> 31:58.067 The Congressional Black Caucus, 31:58.067 --> 31:59.497 the CBC, is formed. 31:59.500 --> 32:01.670 And essentially now we have a critical mass, 32:01.667 --> 32:03.697 still on the small side, but a critical mass, 32:03.700 --> 32:07.670 of black elected officials, House representatives, 32:07.667 --> 32:10.367 and then one in the Senate at that time, 32:12.600 --> 32:19.100 who are going to come together on agendas that we 32:19.100 --> 32:21.800 think we share--on which we share common ground. 32:21.800 --> 32:23.100 Will they always be race agendas? 32:23.100 --> 32:25.000 Ah, you know, I guess that's the presumption, 32:25.000 --> 32:27.070 but there could be common ground on other issues. 32:27.067 --> 32:29.997 It will form like a political action group. 32:30.000 --> 32:32.070 That's essentially what the caucus is. 32:32.067 --> 32:34.467 So you have a rising number of people who are 32:34.467 --> 32:38.497 in--holding positions of power in formal elected 32:38.500 --> 32:43.700 offices, and you have the continuation of grassroots 32:43.700 --> 32:44.770 activism on the ground. 32:44.767 --> 32:50.997 In 1972, and as the snowball's rolling down the 32:51.000 --> 32:54.500 mountain, a number of activists and elected 32:54.500 --> 32:55.500 officials get together, saying, 32:55.500 --> 32:59.970 you know, "We've got a real moment of opportunity here. 32:59.967 --> 33:01.367 We're calling for change." 33:01.367 --> 33:02.997 There are groups like the NWRO, 33:03.000 --> 33:04.400 not just--that's not an all-black group; 33:04.400 --> 33:05.400 I should have made that clear, 33:05.400 --> 33:06.770 it's a multiracial group. 33:06.767 --> 33:09.067 But you have this group on the ground, 33:09.067 --> 33:11.997 other groups like that on the ground, 33:12.000 --> 33:13.600 small political action groups in, 33:13.600 --> 33:15.370 in cities across the country. 33:15.367 --> 33:17.597 You have black militants, certainly. 33:17.600 --> 33:20.300 You have still the black leaders of churches. 33:20.300 --> 33:22.000 That's been there for a long time. 33:22.000 --> 33:23.600 But now you have these black mayors and these black 33:23.600 --> 33:27.100 elected officials and, and House representatives. 33:27.100 --> 33:29.800 Here's a moment where we need to take advantage of, 33:29.800 --> 33:32.700 of our collective experience as African Americans, 33:32.700 --> 33:37.000 come together and try to forge a new voice, 33:37.000 --> 33:38.500 a new black political voice. 33:38.500 --> 33:40.670 So they call for a convention. 33:40.667 --> 33:43.797 The National Black Political Convention is held in 1972 33:43.800 --> 33:45.800 in Gary, Indiana. 33:48.567 --> 33:50.697 It's a meeting of black radicals, 33:50.700 --> 33:53.500 nationalists, and mainstream politicians, 33:53.500 --> 33:55.800 and it has the convention theme of "Unity Without 33:55.800 --> 33:56.800 Uniformity." 33:56.800 --> 34:02.400 And this is now where I spend a couple of minutes 34:02.400 --> 34:06.070 reading excerpts from the, from the platform and from 34:06.067 --> 34:09.667 Amiri Baraka, a radical black poet, 34:09.667 --> 34:12.067 from his poem called "It's Nation Time, 34:12.067 --> 34:15.867 that is rather an aggressive assertion of 34:15.867 --> 34:19.497 black militancy and black nationalism. 34:19.500 --> 34:21.170 And I'll read these two excerpts, 34:21.167 --> 34:23.297 trust me on this, where you have, 34:23.300 --> 34:24.300 you know, this, this--and, and Baraka's one of the 34:24.300 --> 34:28.000 organizers of this, of this meeting. 34:28.000 --> 34:32.270 He had this very ardent black militant voice, 34:32.267 --> 34:34.897 you know, with a poem laced with shotguns, 34:34.900 --> 34:38.000 and racial epithets, and, and, 34:38.000 --> 34:42.370 and challenges to religious orthodoxies that "it's 34:42.367 --> 34:43.867 nation time, it's nation time, 34:43.867 --> 34:46.797 is really, you know, what this--he's calling for in 34:46.800 --> 34:48.200 the poem. 34:48.200 --> 34:50.900 And you have the host of the convention, 34:50.900 --> 34:54.300 like Gary Hatcher, mayor of--it's not Gary 34:54.300 --> 34:57.100 Hatcher--the Mayor Hatcher of Gary, 34:57.100 --> 35:02.500 Indiana, Richard Hatcher, saying, 35:02.500 --> 35:04.270 "Look, we've got to find a way to bridge the 35:04.267 --> 35:06.397 differences," because he's not going to stand on a 35:06.400 --> 35:11.500 platform of--and I'm paraphrasing from Baraka's 35:11.500 --> 35:14.270 phone--poem, "Niggers get your guns." 35:14.267 --> 35:16.697 He's not going to stand on that platform. 35:16.700 --> 35:19.500 We don't want to lose this opportunity--this organizing 35:19.500 --> 35:25.900 opportunity, and emphasizes, "We need to have unity and 35:25.900 --> 35:28.900 understand we cannot be uniform, 35:28.900 --> 35:30.270 harking back to the organizing theme of the 35:30.267 --> 35:32.267 conference. 35:33.567 --> 35:36.497 Now the National Black Political Convention, 35:36.500 --> 35:38.000 what does it leave us with? 35:38.000 --> 35:40.900 It leaves with no clear message. 35:40.900 --> 35:42.700 Think back to the National Negro Congress, 35:42.700 --> 35:48.100 some forty--thirty-five, thirty-six years earlier, 35:48.100 --> 35:50.500 same kind of situation where the coalition of different 35:50.500 --> 35:53.100 kinds of black voices come together, 35:53.100 --> 35:54.300 with an unclear result. 35:54.300 --> 35:58.400 But now these people are elected into office. 35:58.400 --> 36:01.070 The National Black Political Convention exposes the 36:01.067 --> 36:02.667 diversity of political opinions within black 36:02.667 --> 36:03.667 America. 36:03.667 --> 36:05.667 It does that. 36:06.800 --> 36:09.070 And a group grows out of it, the National Black Political 36:09.067 --> 36:11.067 Assembly. 36:12.467 --> 36:14.597 And some thought that the National Black Political 36:14.600 --> 36:16.370 Assembly--essentially like the Congressional Black 36:16.367 --> 36:18.997 Caucus, but now operating at all levels of political 36:19.000 --> 36:21.900 organization in society, grassroots up to the House 36:21.900 --> 36:25.470 of Representatives--some thought that this was an 36:25.467 --> 36:27.297 incredible, going to be an incredible, 36:27.300 --> 36:31.400 incredible vehicle to create real change. 36:31.400 --> 36:34.370 And one of the people who thought it was going to 36:34.367 --> 36:35.767 create change was Shirley Chisholm, 36:35.767 --> 36:37.997 representative from Brooklyn, 36:38.000 --> 36:40.370 and the first woman to represent New York state in 36:40.367 --> 36:41.367 the U.S. 36:41.367 --> 36:43.067 Congress. 36:43.067 --> 36:45.897 Chisholm has just declared her candidacy for the 36:45.900 --> 36:49.570 presidency of the United States and looked to the 36:49.567 --> 36:51.297 activists involved in the Gary convention, 36:51.300 --> 36:53.800 the National Black Political Convention, 36:53.800 --> 36:56.000 looked to the activists at the convention for their 36:56.000 --> 36:58.470 support. 36:58.467 --> 37:00.967 Chisholm's growing out of the tradition now of someone 37:00.967 --> 37:02.697 like Carl Stokes. 37:02.700 --> 37:04.770 She's a real coalition politician. 37:04.767 --> 37:06.897 She was--this was rad--this was controversial at the 37:06.900 --> 37:10.000 time, she was a very public member of the National 37:10.000 --> 37:12.770 Organization for Women, a group that black feminists 37:12.767 --> 37:14.967 thought was just for white women, 37:14.967 --> 37:16.867 something I'll get to a little bit later on as I 37:16.867 --> 37:19.067 close out the lecture. 37:19.067 --> 37:21.167 So Shirley Chisholm has a whole bunch of support, 37:21.167 --> 37:23.297 it seems, from people like Gloria Steinem, 37:23.300 --> 37:26.200 who published Johnnie Tillman's essay about 37:26.200 --> 37:28.500 welfare. 37:28.500 --> 37:31.870 But then something funny happens--not funny ha-ha, 37:31.867 --> 37:36.667 funny unfortunate--is that as Chisholm goes around the 37:36.667 --> 37:38.367 floor of the Gary convention, 37:38.367 --> 37:40.797 as she starts seeking support from her white 37:40.800 --> 37:45.570 feminist friends, the cold, hard reality of politics 37:45.567 --> 37:47.767 invaded. 37:47.767 --> 37:49.867 Black elected officials distanced themselves 37:49.867 --> 37:55.867 immediately from Chisholm, because they believed that 37:58.100 --> 38:00.500 her president--her presidential campaign was an 38:00.500 --> 38:02.200 absolute--an absolute long shot, 38:02.200 --> 38:07.000 and they wanted to align themselves with more likely 38:07.000 --> 38:10.570 Democratic contenders for the national party's 38:10.567 --> 38:11.567 nomination. 38:11.567 --> 38:14.467 A crushing blow comes from Chisholm when she overhears, 38:14.467 --> 38:17.397 at another black political conference, 38:17.400 --> 38:18.400 these two officials. 38:18.400 --> 38:21.400 She's--I guess she's just within earshot. 38:21.400 --> 38:22.400 One of them says to the other, 38:22.400 --> 38:24.870 two black men, "There she is. 38:24.867 --> 38:28.067 That little black matriarch who goes around messing 38:28.067 --> 38:30.067 things up." 38:32.700 --> 38:36.300 So you have rising black political organizations in 38:36.300 --> 38:39.500 the high form of politics, a connection, 38:39.500 --> 38:42.300 it seems, to the grassroots activism that you see in 38:42.300 --> 38:44.900 groups like the NWRO. 38:44.900 --> 38:47.300 Shirley Chisholm tapping into this moment, 38:47.300 --> 38:49.600 like this will be the moment we can really forge change 38:49.600 --> 38:51.200 in this country. 38:51.200 --> 38:54.500 And like someone--I mean Chisholm wasn't running on a 38:54.500 --> 38:56.200 women's platform, per se; she's running on, 38:56.200 --> 38:58.900 running on a liberal politics platform, 38:58.900 --> 39:03.300 but she was seen as unelectable by black elected 39:03.300 --> 39:09.270 officials, and also by the women in groups like NOW. 39:09.267 --> 39:12.297 They cast their support to the more mainstream, 39:12.300 --> 39:18.370 quote, "mainstream" Democratic contenders. 39:18.367 --> 39:21.867 So Shirley Chisholm seems as a complete affirmation of 39:21.867 --> 39:24.397 this double jeopardy status of black women in the United 39:24.400 --> 39:25.400 States. 39:25.400 --> 39:26.400 You know, because she's black, 39:26.400 --> 39:27.400 she's going to be discounted, 39:27.400 --> 39:28.700 because she's a woman, she's going to be discounted. 39:28.700 --> 39:30.770 Just depends on who's doing the discounting. 39:30.767 --> 39:33.767 And Chisholm wasn't the only person to feel this way. 39:33.767 --> 39:36.897 In 1973, a year after the National Black Political 39:36.900 --> 39:42.400 Convention, a group is formed called the National 39:42.400 --> 39:44.570 Black Feminist Organization, the NBFO. 39:47.667 --> 39:50.097 And it sets about to criticize the stereotypes of 39:50.100 --> 39:55.570 black women, criticize the country for caring more 39:55.567 --> 39:58.397 about black men. 39:58.400 --> 39:59.800 As long as the brothers are taken care of, 39:59.800 --> 40:03.070 the sisters will be taken care of eventually. 40:03.067 --> 40:05.497 The NBFO activists took issue with the media for 40:05.500 --> 40:08.200 imposing standards of beauty that are purely 40:08.200 --> 40:10.200 Anglo--Anglophile. 40:12.800 --> 40:14.800 The NBFO addressed practical issues, 40:16.867 --> 40:19.667 like the NRO--NWRO did, like child welfare, 40:19.667 --> 40:21.667 unemployment, etcetera. 40:23.500 --> 40:26.370 And it, the, the National Black Feminist Organization 40:26.367 --> 40:30.597 added, in its ideology, something that had really 40:30.600 --> 40:33.600 been solely the domain of white feminist movement to 40:33.600 --> 40:36.470 that point, namely abortion rights and equal rights 40:36.467 --> 40:38.967 amendment. 40:38.967 --> 40:41.897 It is an organization with an ideologically broad 40:41.900 --> 40:46.700 umbrella on feminist issues, broader in its opinion than 40:46.700 --> 40:49.300 the National Organization for Women. 40:49.300 --> 40:52.500 Now the NBFO, perhaps predictably, 40:52.500 --> 40:54.300 was met with a strong backlash. 40:54.300 --> 41:00.100 It was accused of hampering the black movement, 41:00.100 --> 41:01.700 in air quotes, "the black movement, 41:01.700 --> 41:02.970 is accused of hampering it. 41:02.967 --> 41:06.297 You know, getting people confused about what's the 41:06.300 --> 41:08.300 real voice of black America. 41:08.300 --> 41:10.600 Is accused of being man-hating, 41:12.700 --> 41:15.100 in part--in large part because it welcomed lesbians 41:15.100 --> 41:17.100 into its organizations, publicly. 41:18.967 --> 41:21.497 Now all of the NBFO collapses, 41:21.500 --> 41:23.000 almost as quickly as it's formed. 41:23.000 --> 41:25.670 It does not last long. 41:25.667 --> 41:27.697 It exposed a range of hot button issues within the 41:27.700 --> 41:30.770 black community and inspired other groups to form, 41:30.767 --> 41:33.367 most famously, the Combahee River Collective. 41:33.367 --> 41:36.797 I want to turn quickly to the Combahee River 41:36.800 --> 41:38.700 Collective statement, the collective statement, 41:38.700 --> 41:41.600 and point, to some--point to some of these hot button 41:41.600 --> 41:42.600 issues. 41:42.600 --> 41:44.770 The statement reads that, "We are a collective of 41:44.767 --> 41:47.097 black feminists who have been meeting together since 41:47.100 --> 41:50.300 1974, involved in the process of defining and 41:50.300 --> 41:53.070 clarifying our politics, while doing political work 41:53.067 --> 41:55.497 within our own group and in coalition with other 41:55.500 --> 41:58.100 progressive organizations and movements. 41:58.100 --> 42:01.200 We see black feminism as the logical political movement 42:01.200 --> 42:04.270 to combat the manifold and simultaneous oppression that 42:04.267 --> 42:07.067 all women of color face." 42:07.067 --> 42:09.767 It goes into the genesis of contemporary black feminism, 42:11.800 --> 42:14.300 and then has three points of what we believe, 42:14.300 --> 42:16.500 the problems in organizing black feminists, 42:16.500 --> 42:18.270 and black feminist issues and projects. 42:18.267 --> 42:20.297 And I'm excerpting here. 42:20.300 --> 42:22.200 "What We Believe," the statement says, 42:22.200 --> 42:24.570 "Although we are feminists and lesbians, 42:24.567 --> 42:27.097 we feel solidarity with progressive black men and do 42:27.100 --> 42:29.970 not advocate the fractionalization that white 42:29.967 --> 42:32.797 women who are separatists demand. 42:32.800 --> 42:36.000 We struggle together with black men against racism, 42:36.000 --> 42:39.600 while we also struggle with black men about sexism. 42:39.600 --> 42:42.400 We are socialists because we believe that work must be 42:42.400 --> 42:45.200 organized for the collective benefit of those who do the 42:45.200 --> 42:47.070 work and create the products, 42:47.067 --> 42:50.167 and not for the profit of the bosses. 42:50.167 --> 42:52.667 We need to articulate the real class situation of, 42:52.667 --> 42:55.467 of persons for whom racial and sexual oppression are 42:55.467 --> 42:57.597 significant determinants in their working, 42:57.600 --> 42:59.600 economic lives." 43:01.300 --> 43:03.370 Calling on the recognition of problems in organizing 43:03.367 --> 43:06.097 black feminists, the Combahee River Collective 43:06.100 --> 43:07.870 says that, "The major source of difficulty in our 43:07.867 --> 43:10.197 political work is that we are trying to address a 43:10.200 --> 43:11.800 whole range of oppressions. 43:11.800 --> 43:14.700 We are dispossessed psychologically and on every 43:14.700 --> 43:17.600 other level, and yet we feel the necessity to struggle to 43:17.600 --> 43:20.000 change the condition of all black women. 43:20.000 --> 43:23.470 If black women were free, it would mean that everyone 43:23.467 --> 43:26.197 else would have to be free, since our freedom would 43:26.200 --> 43:28.700 necessitate the destruction of all the systems of 43:28.700 --> 43:29.700 oppression." 43:29.700 --> 43:33.570 Again, that notion of multiple forms of, 43:33.567 --> 43:36.067 of oppression weighing down on blackness and, 43:36.067 --> 43:38.067 and female--women, womanhood. 43:39.967 --> 43:41.597 And it says in terms of "Black Feminist Issues and 43:41.600 --> 43:43.500 Projects," is one of the, "One issue that is of major 43:43.500 --> 43:45.770 concern to us, and that we have begun to publicly 43:45.767 --> 43:47.997 address, is racism in the white women's movement." 43:48.000 --> 43:53.000 I made reference to this earlier, 43:53.000 --> 43:59.800 Shirley Chisholm's sort of confront--what am I looking? 43:59.800 --> 44:02.100 Wow, just completely drew a blank on a very basic 44:02.100 --> 44:06.700 word--controversial, on her controversial membership in 44:06.700 --> 44:10.000 the National Organization for Women. 44:10.000 --> 44:12.900 In the successful rise of the, 44:12.900 --> 44:18.900 the feminist movement, black women start telling stories 44:18.900 --> 44:21.370 of trying to affiliate with what are essentially white 44:21.367 --> 44:23.367 groups. 44:24.500 --> 44:26.400 And the stories they start to tell are rather--stories 44:26.400 --> 44:29.100 of great frustration, and they, 44:29.100 --> 44:31.870 they're, they replicate themselves constantly. 44:31.867 --> 44:35.097 Black woman going into a meeting of local N--NOW 44:35.100 --> 44:39.370 activists and having her voice being the only voice 44:39.367 --> 44:42.067 that's silenced, or having black organization, 44:42.067 --> 44:44.897 a women's organization, trying to affiliate with the 44:44.900 --> 44:47.000 white women's organization, and the white activists 44:47.000 --> 44:49.070 trying to take over the black women's organization. 44:49.067 --> 44:53.297 Presump--presumption of who knows best. 44:53.300 --> 44:54.700 So the Combahee River Collective, 44:54.700 --> 44:56.700 the National Black Feminist Organization before it as 44:56.700 --> 45:00.000 well, and people like Shirley Chisholm, 45:00.000 --> 45:03.300 all recognizing that there is something flawed, 45:03.300 --> 45:07.570 even in women's rights organizations, 45:07.567 --> 45:09.597 and it's, it's the racial dynamic. 45:15.067 --> 45:19.197 So you have a rising sense of black feminist political 45:19.200 --> 45:23.470 awareness and determination to change the conversation. 45:23.467 --> 45:25.297 Shirley Chisholm was certainly frustrated, 45:25.300 --> 45:28.700 but she's committed to change. 45:28.700 --> 45:32.170 In this era, on the political front, 45:32.167 --> 45:34.597 you see a reflection of that commitment to change, 45:34.600 --> 45:36.100 where the number of black women who are elected 45:36.100 --> 45:42.300 officials skyrockets from fifteen percent of the black 45:42.300 --> 45:46.570 elected officials are women in the late sixties, 45:46.567 --> 45:49.397 to nearly sixty percent by the end of the 1970s. 45:49.400 --> 45:55.070 A humongous change in who's representing this 45:55.067 --> 46:00.097 constituency, presumptively but not always representing 46:00.100 --> 46:01.170 a black constituency. 46:01.167 --> 46:05.597 Now as I did on Monday, I was talking about the 46:05.600 --> 46:11.670 incredible cultural power of the moment, 46:11.667 --> 46:17.067 and the interesting narratives of misogyny and 46:17.067 --> 46:21.197 hyper-masculinity you see in blaxploitation films. 46:21.200 --> 46:23.800 This is also an era that you see the beginning of an 46:23.800 --> 46:26.670 incredible renaissance in black women's literature 46:26.667 --> 46:29.597 especially. 46:29.600 --> 46:31.800 The great author Toni Morrison appearing on the 46:31.800 --> 46:35.670 scene with The Bluest Eye in 1970. 46:35.667 --> 46:38.297 Alice Walker, who would become most famous for 46:38.300 --> 46:41.200 writing Colored--ha-ha, I just noticed here, 46:41.200 --> 46:44.500 in my typing these notes here, 46:44.500 --> 46:49.000 I wrote, I wrote Colored People--The Color Purple. 46:49.000 --> 46:50.600 Just noticed that big old typo. 46:50.600 --> 46:55.300 Anyway, Alice Walker, who published that book in 1982, 46:55.300 --> 46:56.770 but in the seventies, she was doing an incredible 46:56.767 --> 46:58.997 amount of recovery work. 46:59.000 --> 47:01.170 For example, who's, who here has heard of Zora Neale 47:01.167 --> 47:02.167 Hurston? 47:02.167 --> 47:04.767 I mean pretty much everybody. 47:04.767 --> 47:07.497 None of your hands would have gone up prior to the 47:07.500 --> 47:08.500 nine--early 1970s. 47:08.500 --> 47:11.300 And the hands are being raised now because of Alice 47:11.300 --> 47:12.900 Walker's, essentially, detective work. 47:12.900 --> 47:15.700 She makes it her mission, for example, 47:15.700 --> 47:18.070 to discover Zora Neale Hurston's grave, 47:18.067 --> 47:19.067 unmarked. 47:19.067 --> 47:21.397 Zora Neale Hurston had this incredible moment in the, 47:21.400 --> 47:23.070 in the late thirties and forties, 47:23.067 --> 47:24.397 but disappears. 47:24.400 --> 47:27.500 She dies penniless, she's working as a maid, 47:27.500 --> 47:30.300 her writing disappears. 47:30.300 --> 47:33.570 Alice Walker discovers it and makes an attempt, 47:33.567 --> 47:36.497 a concerted effort, to bring her back into the literary 47:36.500 --> 47:38.200 conversation in American letters, 47:38.200 --> 47:40.200 and does it quite successfully. 47:42.467 --> 47:44.197 And she's recognizing, Alice Walker is, 47:44.200 --> 47:47.000 in this recuperative work, dealing with Zora Neale 47:47.000 --> 47:50.100 Hurston, that this new voice, 47:50.100 --> 47:51.100 or in Zora Neale Hurston's case, 47:51.100 --> 47:53.400 an older voice, but a new way of listening to this 47:53.400 --> 47:55.400 voice. 47:56.400 --> 47:59.800 It's about black women who wanted to declare political 47:59.800 --> 48:02.070 engagement on their own terms, 48:02.067 --> 48:05.767 not men's, not black men's, and not white women's. 48:05.767 --> 48:08.767 And Walker calls for a new term that would apply to 48:08.767 --> 48:10.467 black women in general and that's womanist. 48:10.467 --> 48:13.967 A womanist politics is a black feminist politics. 48:17.800 --> 48:20.470 Walker, when asked to comment on the combination 48:20.467 --> 48:23.367 of events over the previous decades that open up the 48:23.367 --> 48:26.497 possibilities for black women, 48:26.500 --> 48:28.300 she said, speaking of her characters, 48:28.300 --> 48:32.570 said "My women in the future will not burn themselves up. 48:32.567 --> 48:34.967 Now I am ready to look at women who have made the room 48:34.967 --> 48:37.197 larger for others to move in. 48:37.200 --> 48:39.170 I think one reason I never stay away from the southern 48:39.167 --> 48:41.497 movement is because I realize how deeply political 48:41.500 --> 48:44.800 changes affect the choices and lifestyles of people. 48:44.800 --> 48:46.400 The movement of the sixties, Black Power, 48:46.400 --> 48:49.300 the Muslims, the Panthers, have changed the options of 48:49.300 --> 48:51.270 black people generally and of black women in 48:51.267 --> 48:55.397 particular, so that my women characters won't all end the 48:55.400 --> 48:58.800 way they have been, because black women now offer the 48:58.800 --> 49:03.070 varied, live models of how it is possible to live. 49:03.067 --> 49:05.997 We have a new place to move." 49:06.000 --> 49:07.400 And move they did. 49:07.400 --> 49:10.170 We will pick up discussion on next Monday. 49:10.167 --> 49:12.167 Thank you.