Resistance

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A man stands in front of the Djingareyber mosque on February 4, 2016 in Timbuktu, central Mali. Mali's fabled city of Timbuktu on February 4 celebrated the recovery of its historic mausoleums, destroyed during an Islamist takeover of northern Mali in 2012 and rebuilt thanks to UN cultural agency UNESCO. TO GO WITH AFP STORY BY SEBASTIEN RIEUSSEC / AFP / SÉBASTIEN RIEUSSEC
African Peoples Before Captivity
Shackles from Slave Ship Henrietta Marie
Kidnapped: The Middle Passage
Enslaved family picking cotton
Nearly Three Centuries Of Enslavement
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Reconstruction: A Brief Glimpse of Freedom
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One Hundred Years of Jim Crow
Civil Rights protest in Alabama
I Am Somebody! The Struggle for Justice
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NOW: Free At Last?
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Memorial to the Victims of Lynching
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The Freedom-Lovers’ Roll Call Wall
Frozen custard in Milwaukee's Bronzeville
Special Exhibits
Dr. James Cameron
Portraiture of Resistance

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"Resistance" is one of America's Black Holocaust Museum's four themes, which serve as pillars in our virtual museum.

People of African descent in this country have been targets of injustice for five hundred years, but they have not been simply victims. At America's Black Holocaust Virtual Museum, we remember the many ways that black people and freedom-loving white people have resisted injustice, even when doing so threatened their lives and liberty.

However, resistance can also take on a negative format when those people who have benefitted from systemic racism oppose changes that would benefit the Black community or other people of color. We are currently in the midst of cultural and political resistance that threatens equality and progress.

Many events and breaking news articles continue to showcase this theme as Black Americans break stereotypes and barriers to success.

The Speech That Shocked Birmingham the Day After the Church Bombing

September 16, 2013

The day after four little girls were murdered in church, a young white family man gave a speech about racism at a meeting of his Birmingham men’s club. He was to be forever shunned. This is what he said.

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Why the Zimmerman Jury Failed Us

July 14, 2013
George Zimmerman

Harvard professor Lawrence Bobo explains how the Zimmerman verdict reflects the racism at America’s core – leading to the continual dehumanization of blacks. When cultural racism is this deeply embedded in America’s basic cultural toolkit, it need not be named or even consciously embraced to work its ill effects.

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Bernard Lafayette: An Unsung Veteran of the Voting Rights Struggle

July 7, 2013

Bernard Lafayette is one of the founding fathers of the Voting Rights Act. He was part of a small interracial army of men and women who presented their bodies as living sacrifices for the Act. Some lost their friends, their families, their minds — even their lives. But 50 years after their greatest triumph, their struggle is in danger of being lost.

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Turning the Tables on Civil Rights: The 1970s and 1980s

June 17, 2012

Why didn’t the Civil Rights Movement end racism in America? The social movements of the 1960s achieved some important changes for civil rights, women’s rights, and the environment. However, not everyone agreed with these changes. During the 1970s and 1980s, opponents started a movement of their own. Their goal was to overturn the gains of the 1960s.

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Social Movements and Organizations of the 1960s, 70s and 80s

June 17, 2012

The 1960s saw an upsurge in civil rights and other organizations promoting freedom and equality for blacks and women. The 1970s brought a backlash against those movements by well-funded and well-placed organizations of the Right seeking more freedom for corporations and a return to traditional roles for women. In the 1980’s, hip-hop and punk rock music expressed anger at “The Power” through their lyrics instead of through actions to change laws.

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