The second volume on the life and works of Hubert Harrison, the Harlem-based activist, organizer and journalist, is about to be released. Biographer Jeff Perry has spent almost four decades researching Harrison, who he described as “a socialist who worked closely with Marcus Garvey and was the first to write about the ‘New Negro’ in the first quarter of the 20th century.” Harrison deserves to be in the pantheon of formative Black political thinkers and doers, but his principled politics, unsparing journalistic critiques, and refusal to be bought earned him few boosters.
The U.S. can never be reformed to render justice to its African residents. “Our struggle must have Africa at its core.”
Detroit’s wanton killing of hundreds of Blacks in the civil right era shows why most of today’s proposals to make police more accountable are bound to fail.
There was no way to make light of this daunting book and its effects on me, no matter how much I thought I knew it.
The author explores various social, political, and cultural sites that explore and highlight the Black pastoral experience.
In the past year or two, the proposition of defunding or abolishing police and prisons has travelled from incarcerated-activist networks into mainstream conversations.
