Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

White Supremacy Goes Back to the Crusades
Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
12 Nov 2019
🖨️ Print Article

The roots of western European anti-Blackness lie in the Middle Ages, in the Crusades to seize Arab lands, said Cord Whitaker, a professor at Wellesley College and author of “Black Metaphors: How Racism Emerged from Medieval Race-Thinking.” It was during this era that “you started to see the idea that darkness of skin, blackness, denoted potential evil,” said Whitaker. “It was still not the racial ideology we have today, but it was an important step in getting there.”

white supremacy

Related Podcasts

BAR Radio
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Black Agenda Radio September 11, 2026
11 September 2026
In this week’s segment, we discuss the 55th anniversary and legacy of the 1971 Attica prison revolt. But we begin with the history of W.E.B.
Gerald Horne
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Gerald Horne, "Black and Red: Du Bois and the Afro American response to the Cold War, 1944-63"
11 September 2026
Our guest is Dr.
Patriot Front in DC
Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
Opposing Patriot Front and White Supremacist Groups
10 July 2026
Daryle Lamont Jenkins is founder of One People’s Project, which seeks to combat and exp

More Stories


  • M23
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Congo's Elite Struggle for Power While Imperialist Control and Violence Decimates the Country
    16 Oct 2026
    Joseph Kabila, former president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, named himself president of the Front for the Rebuilding of the Nation. He is now formally allied with M23, the Rwanda-backed…
  • Isaac Saney
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    The Canadian and U.S. Partnership in Settler Colonialism, Enslavement, and Imperialism
    16 Oct 2026
    Isaac Saney is a Cuba and Black Studies specialist and historian at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. He discusses the U.S./Canadian partnership in settler colonialism,…
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    European Vassal States' Self-Destruction Endangers the Entire World
    14 Oct 2026
    European puppet states have undermined themselves and their peoples' needs at the behest of the U.S. Now, that subservience may lead to war.
  • ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    From Capitalist Crisis to Crisis of Whiteness: Rubio, Western Decline, and the Defense of White Supremacy
    14 Oct 2026
    Marco Rubio's appeals to Western civilization, Christian heritage, and the defense of Western dominance are fundamental to the consolidating global fascist project, functioning to transform a crisis…
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    INTERVIEW: Elections and economic crisis in Guyana: Interview with Working People's Alliance leader Eusi Kwayana, 1986
    14 Oct 2026
    “So we started to preach the doctrine of self-organization. And we made it very clear what we were after — the genuine multiracial and democratic power of the working people.”
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us