Civil Rights Movement
Ashley Plunkett
November 28th, 2017
Book Review #3
Waiting Til The Midnight Hour:
A Restoration of The Black Power Image in America
Peniel E. Joseph’s Waiting Til The Midnight Hour desperately tries to eradicate the limited perception that a majority of people have surrounded the American Civil Rights Movement. In the world of Martin Luther King's and Rosa Parks, the Black Power Movement tends to fall into an oversimplification consisting of pro-violence riots and aggressive opposition of white Americans. Joseph uses his narrative to enlighten contemporaries on the authentic Black Power ethos spanning from the second world war to the 1970s.
Many people attribute Black Power only to Malcolm …show more content…
While he attempts to put the movement into greater context, and succeeded in introducing the more expanded understanding of Black Power and its goals, Joseph composes a narrative that serves only as an introduction into a concept rather than an in-depth analysis. The contrasting elements of Pan-Africanism, which was a popular idea during the Civil Rights Movement, does not entirely complete the pre-established thesis. If the point of the narrative is to establish a contrast of the Black Power Movement from the greater Civil Rights Movement and educate the reader on the ethos of said Black Power Movement from the narrow-minded limitations propagated by modern historians, the method chosen fails to inspire anything other than boredom when integrating the international climate. It can be assumed the purpose of doing so remains centered around the overall context, but other than illuminating the frictions that developed with decolonization and communism, it seems counterintuitive. A metaphor to Joseph, at least this reader took, as the story of African American slavery can compare to the overtaking of African countries by European powers. In the frankest of terms, more white people affecting and disrupting black people. However, in terms of comparing the Civil Rights Movement to Black Power Movement, the necessity escapes …show more content…
The comparison of the Black Power idea of individualism and cultural appreciation, that black culture was as meaningful and complex as white and should be held within the same esteem, the reader poses the question of contemporary arguments surrounding the same ideology. In terms of African American people being equal to whites, does the modern ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement not compare? The argument poses a feverish debate of ‘black lives matter’ which is often taken as an aggressive ego-sensical edict solely meant to overpower the consideration given to white lives, as some suspected Black Power to be. While a majority of those taking part of the movement would dispel the idea, posing that the phrase does not dispel that consideration but re-enforces that ‘black lives matter’ as well. However, the argument then becomes, ‘All lives matter’ and thus loops continuously. This comparison arose after completing the novel, and initially, the similarities between these two ignorant assumptions, that the campaigns focus on superiority or ‘all or nothing’ mentality, made the reader wonder if there was more she could learn or if any formal comparisons had been made. This new question, while not the idea of the book, resulted in a deeper questioning in the context of the ongoing Civil Rights Movement. So, if nothing else, the book inspired some measure of enjoyment, if only said
Ashley Plunkett
November 28th, 2017
Book Review #3
Waiting Til The Midnight Hour:
A Restoration of The Black Power Image in America
Peniel E. Joseph’s Waiting Til The Midnight Hour desperately tries to eradicate the limited perception that a majority of people have surrounded the American Civil Rights Movement. In the world of Martin Luther King's and Rosa Parks, the Black Power Movement tends to fall into an oversimplification consisting of pro-violence riots and aggressive opposition of white Americans. Joseph uses his narrative to enlighten contemporaries on the authentic Black Power ethos spanning from the second world war to the 1970s.
Many people attribute Black Power only to Malcolm …show more content…
While he attempts to put the movement into greater context, and succeeded in introducing the more expanded understanding of Black Power and its goals, Joseph composes a narrative that serves only as an introduction into a concept rather than an in-depth analysis. The contrasting elements of Pan-Africanism, which was a popular idea during the Civil Rights Movement, does not entirely complete the pre-established thesis. If the point of the narrative is to establish a contrast of the Black Power Movement from the greater Civil Rights Movement and educate the reader on the ethos of said Black Power Movement from the narrow-minded limitations propagated by modern historians, the method chosen fails to inspire anything other than boredom when integrating the international climate. It can be assumed the purpose of doing so remains centered around the overall context, but other than illuminating the frictions that developed with decolonization and communism, it seems counterintuitive. A metaphor to Joseph, at least this reader took, as the story of African American slavery can compare to the overtaking of African countries by European powers. In the frankest of terms, more white people affecting and disrupting black people. However, in terms of comparing the Civil Rights Movement to Black Power Movement, the necessity escapes …show more content…
The comparison of the Black Power idea of individualism and cultural appreciation, that black culture was as meaningful and complex as white and should be held within the same esteem, the reader poses the question of contemporary arguments surrounding the same ideology. In terms of African American people being equal to whites, does the modern ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement not compare? The argument poses a feverish debate of ‘black lives matter’ which is often taken as an aggressive ego-sensical edict solely meant to overpower the consideration given to white lives, as some suspected Black Power to be. While a majority of those taking part of the movement would dispel the idea, posing that the phrase does not dispel that consideration but re-enforces that ‘black lives matter’ as well. However, the argument then becomes, ‘All lives matter’ and thus loops continuously. This comparison arose after completing the novel, and initially, the similarities between these two ignorant assumptions, that the campaigns focus on superiority or ‘all or nothing’ mentality, made the reader wonder if there was more she could learn or if any formal comparisons had been made. This new question, while not the idea of the book, resulted in a deeper questioning in the context of the ongoing Civil Rights Movement. So, if nothing else, the book inspired some measure of enjoyment, if only said