Abstract
Shirley Clarke’s remarkable independent film, The Cool World, shot in Harlem in 1963, opens with a black man standing on a stoop before a small crowd indicting America’s “white devils” for centuries of slavery, Jim Crow, and racist violence. The listeners follow his every word, some nodding in confirmation, others fascinated but skeptical. As the camera pans we see a handful of people carrying signs as if they were preparing to launch a protest march, and one man holds up a newspaper with the bold headline “Exempt Negroes from Taxes.” The speaker, probably a member of the Nation of Islam, really has one point to make: Our time has come and we are declaring war.
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© 2003 Jeanne Theoharis and Komozi Woodard, with Matthew Countryman
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Kelley, R.D.G. (2003). Afterword. In: Theoharis, J., Woodard, K. (eds) Freedom North: Black Freedom Struggles Outside the South, 1940–1980. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-8250-6_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4039-8250-6_13
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Print ISBN: 978-0-312-29468-7
Online ISBN: 978-1-4039-8250-6
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