Here are the questions for Week 6. Please respond to one question by using at least 3 resources, particularly from those given to you in the Additional Course Materials area (my lecture) and from the 3 materials from the Course Materials area: 1) Peniel Joseph’s article about the Black Panthers’ long-term effect on African Americans; 2) Article on former BPP member, Kathleen Cleaver; 3) the FBI’s files on the BPP from the 1960s and 1970s. Do not forget to use both in-text citations and a list of sources at the end. Use APA, MLA, or Chicago, but do not make up your own citation style. The syllabus, the UMGC Library, and the free EWC can all give you clues on how to cite correctly. Please make each word count — 300-350 words only.
Question 1: Do you agree with Peniel Joseph’s assessment of the legacy of the Black Power/Black Panther movements? In other words, what does Joseph state are these movements’ main achievements that have left a positive legacy for African Americans to 2021? Are those achievements as noteworthy as Joseph thinks they are? Your thesis will make a claim answering these questions but will also continue after the word “because…..”
Questions 2: From The Poetry Foundation’s Website, look up articles about Nikki Giovanni. Do you think that her poem “Nikki-Rosa” (also at this website) fits into what the Black Arts Movement was about as a movement beyond civil rights and into authentic black expression? Your thesis will make a claim about what the Black Arts Movement stood for and how NG’s poetry in the 1960s and early 1970s was a part of what BAM was trying to do (or not).
Question 3: What would you argue were the most important recommendations from the Kerner Commission Report that would have assisted with mitigating racism in the U.S. in the late 1960s and early 1970s? Your thesis will be: “The most important recommendations emanating from the Kerner Commission report were ____ and ____ because if our nation had done those two things, X would have happened.”
Question 4: Both the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 are under attack. Go to The Brennan Center for Justice and read about the threats to voting that are occurring now. What is the “For the People Act”? Your thesis should be why you think Congress should pass this Act as soon as possible (or not) because . . . .
