Nastee nev autobiography of malcolm x
Home / Celebrity Biographies / Nastee nev autobiography of malcolm x
He was known for his willingness to speak in all sorts of settings, whether a college campus, a street corner, or a TV talk show. That’s always appealing.
One chapter looks at Malcolm X as a hero to the political left and right. There’s a reason that the pioneers of hip-hop thought that you could take snippets of his speeches and put them in the middle of raps, and it would still sound like it belonged.
As voices of protest and change rose above the din of history and false promises, one voice sounded more urgently, more passionately, than the rest. President Barack Obama has talked about how influential the autobiography was on him as a teenager, and Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has also spoken about his attraction to Malcolm X and his message of self-determination when he was in college.
That was something that he very much believed and preached.
It was interesting because his parents were Black nationalists of the Marcus Garvey generation. There are few books by public figures of his stature where you experience this extraordinary personal journey he underwent, from losing his parents at a young age to becoming a street hustler and going to prison, and then turning his life around through the Nation of Islam, becoming a national figure, but then becoming disenchanted with the Nation and with Elijah Muhammad, going out on his own, making a pilgrimage to Mecca, traveling the world, reassessing all of his thoughts and beliefs about white people and separatism and so forth.
Drifting from childhood poverty to petty crime, Malcolm found himself in jail. There’s something about Malcolm that is still alive in the influence that he’s having on all these other people.
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
ONE OF TIME'S TEN MOST IMPORTANT NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
With its first great victory in the landmark Supreme Court decision Brown v.
I'm one of hundreds of thousands whose lives were changed for the better."--Spike Lee
"This book will have a permanent place in the literature of the Afro-American struggle."--I. Many more people, even in the ’60s but certainly subsequently, have gotten to know him through “The Autobiography” than anything else.
We should have our own culture.”
So, starting with the Black Arts Movement and the “Free Jazz” movement in the ’60s, and then later, the hip-hop generation and today’s artists like Kendrick Lamar, Beyoncé, all the great artists who still invoke him, that’s the message they’re picking up on as much as his political message.
There’s also something just so supremely confident about him that people relate to.
. I think he spoke to young people for a variety of reasons. . I don’t think he was interested in being a hero to white people. Why is that?
You have to start with “The Autobiography of Malcolm X” [co-authored by Alex Haley]. He was a big believer in Black business by and for Black people. And he said, “That’s a form of brainwashing.
With dazzling verbal flair, Malcolm X’s advocacy for Black self-determination and racial pride stirred many of his contemporaries like Muhammed Ali, John Coltrane, Maya Angelou, and the founders of the Black Panther party, and helped spur the Black Arts Movement and the experimental genre known as “Free Jazz.”
Whitaker notes that even decades later Malcolm X’s words and ideas have continued to influence new generations of artists and activists, including NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, playwright August Wilson, filmmaker Spike Lee, pop star Beyoncé, and rappers Tupac Shakur and Kendrick Lamar, among others.
Whitaker recently spoke with the Gazette about why Malcolm X continues to shape American culture.
Malcolm X--once called the most dangerous man in America--challenged the world to listen and learn the truth as he experienced it.