African American Leaders 2

During this time of racial segregation, the three authors, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and W. E. B. DuBois expressed very different views from one another, representing the broad spectrum of feelings and reactions anoung the African American population reguarding their inequality. In his "Letter From Birmingham Jail," Martin Luther King Jr. emphasezed on the immediate necessity to actively promote and demant equal rights for African Americans. Malcolm X, on the other hand, suggests that African Americans shouldn't seek racial integration, but to fight against the white Americans for the land to create a black nation, as explained in his "Message to the Grassroots." Lastly, in W. E. B. DuBois's "The Souls of Black Folk," neither an intense desire for racial segregation, nor a strong urge to revolte against the white Americans is presnet. Instead, he focuses on education as a tool to prove that African Americans are equal with white Americans. These three separate reactions to unequal rights for African Americans all show different interpretations of the relationship between African Americans and mainstream, white American culture.
The work of Martin Luther King Jr. conceptualizes the relationship of African-Americans to mainstream, white American culture as each being able to become a part of each other.He saw African Americans and white Americans as equal human beings living together, as one, in society. In his "Letter From Birmingham Jail," Martin Luther King Jr. shows his intense desire for African Americans to have the same rights and privalages that white Americans enjoy. He also wishes for the two races to integrate and become a whole, just, and unified nation. King encouraged African Americans to protest against their inequality by using nonviolent and peaceful civil disobedience. He was put into jail for being responsible for a voter-registration drive in Bermingham. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote, "Letter From Birmingham Jail" inresponse to numerous... [continues]

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