Righteous Propagation

African Americans and the Politics of Racial Destiny After Reconstruction

By: Michele Mitchell

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Paperback | 6 December 2004

At a Glance

Paperback
416 Pages

Edition Type
New edition

Dimensions(cm)
22.86 x 15.24 x 3.18

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Between 1877 and 1930--years rife with tensions over citizenship, suffrage, immigration, and "the Negro problem--African American activists promoted an array of strategies for progress and power built around "racial destiny," the idea that black Americans formed a collective whose future existence would be determined by the actions of its members. In Righteous Propagation, Michele Mitchell examines the reproductive implications of racial destiny, demonstrating how it forcefully linked particular visions of gender, conduct, and sexuality to collective well-being.

Mitchell argues that while African Americans did not agree on specific ways to bolster their collective prospects, ideas about racial destiny and progress generally shifted from outward-looking remedies such as emigration to inward-focused debates about intraracial relationships, thereby politicizing the most private aspects of black life and spurring race activists to calcify gender roles, monitor intraracial sexual practices, and promote moral purity. Examining the ideas of well-known elite reformers such as Mary Church Terrell and W. E. B. DuBois, as well as unknown members of the working and aspiring classes, such as James Dubose and Josie Briggs Hall, Mitchell reinterprets black protest and politics and recasts the way we think about black sexuality and progress after Reconstruction.

Industry Reviews

"Breathing new life into a familiar narrative, Mitchell's 'social history of ideas' offers more breadth and depth than intellectual histories of race leaders. . . . By tackling the most sensitive aspects of racial reform--imperialism, eugenics, and female sexuality--she has done us a great service."
-- "Journal of American History"
"Makes vital contributions to the historiography of American sexuality and offers a provocative reinterpretation of black cultural history. . . . Should be mandatory reading for historians of African American history and for a broader audience seeking to gain a fuller understanding of Americans' longstanding debates over black respectability and sexuality."
-- "Historian"
"Mitchell's nuanced analysis of the politics of racial destiny encompasses a broad spectrum of social projects and activists. . . . [She] has painstakingly uncovered the authors, social networks, texts, and cultural artifacts of a relatively unknown body of social thought."
-- "American Historical Review"

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Prologue : to better our condition one way or another : African Americans and the concept of racial destiny	p. 3
A great, grand, & all important question : African American emigration to Liberia	p. 16
The black man's burden : imperialism and racial manhood	p. 51
The strongest, most intimate hope of the race : sexuality, reproduction, and Afro-American vitality	p. 76
The righteous propagation of the nation : conduct, conflict, and sexuality	p. 108
Making the home life measure up : environment, class, and the healthy race household	p. 141
The colored doll is a live one! : material culture, black consciousness, and cultivation of intraracial desire	p. 173
A burden of responsibility : gender, "miscegenation," and race type	p. 197
What a pure, healthy, unified race can accomplish : collective reproduction and the sexual politics of black nationalism	p. 218
Epilogue : the crossroads of destiny	p. 241
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.

Righteous Propagation

African Americans and the Politics of Racial Destiny After Reconstruction

At a Glance

Paperback

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

You Can Find This Book In

Other Editions and Formats

ePUB

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