Ella Baker's Role In The Civil Rights Movement

Ella Josephine Baker was known to be an unsung hero during the trials and tribulations of the Civil Rights Movement. She was one of the women who contributed in achieving civil and human rights for minority people. She cooperated with many organizations to establish her goal, such as motivating the discriminated into standing up for themselves. Ella Baker’s childhood, political activism, and the influences of her actions all contributed in ending discrimination against African Americans and other minority groups during the Civil Rights Movement.

There are several borders that are crossed every day. Border crossing is a hotly debated topic and immediately images of physical borders come to mind, however, nonphysical borders have been just as prevalent in the past and modern history of several nations. Nonphysical borders, such as the border between citizens and politics, have been manufacturers of social change for centuries. In the United States the border between citizens and politics has always had an active role especially when the need for political change arises. While government leaders have supreme power and are entrusted to make change, citizens need to be heard in politics and need to have the ability to make political change.

Marian Anderson was a driven African American singer. "We don't take colored" (Collins 106). Marian was deprived of singing in many places because of the color of her skin. She was always well behaved and never wanted conflict so she never would argue.

There has been a time in American history where there was segregation and there were even laws that allowed it. Those laws are no longer present and neither is segregation. There were people that had a big impact on this decision. These people are called civil rights activists. Civil rights activists were people that fought for minorities to be treated equal and have equal opportunities.

Dorothy height was born in Richmond Virginia on March 24, 1912. Height was a civil rights activist along with a women’s right activist. Over the span of her career height received more than 50 awards from varies local, state, and national organizations. Some her major awards that she received were; Presidential Citizens Medal in 1989, Spingarn Medal in 1993, Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1994, Jefferson Awards for Public Service in 2001, Heinz Awards in 2001, and Congressional Gold Medal in 2004. While height was fighting for social reforms for both genders she was mainly focused on reforms for African American women.

Ransby wrote about the complexity of Ella Baker's life. Ransby stated: "for me, in looking back as Baker's life in all of its rich complexity" (Ransby, Pg). In the writing the biography, Ransby brought to life a person in her writing. Her argument centered on the idea of complexity. The complexity of Baker's life leads to the importance of her legacy.

The target audience we approached was decision maker, Catharine Baker. Catharine Baker is a Republican, California Assembly Member who is currently the elected assembly member for district 16. We presented AB 2590, Restorative Justice Act. We presented with the intent to influence and educate decision maker Baker with the hopes of her supporting this bill. Catharine Baker was born on May 1, 1971 in Cathedral City, California.

On March 03, 1913, thousands of women marched down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington D.C. as a form of protest in order to gain suffrage rights for women. Before the march, however, one of the parade organizers, Alice Paul, urged black suffragettes including Ida B. Wells to not march with Caucasian women. She feared white suffragists may have not wanted to participate in the parade if they had to march with African American women. People within and outside of the suffrage movement including the government often discriminated against black suffragettes on the account of race, which could have made obtaining voting rights for them more difficult. As a way of combatting exclusion from the suffrage movement, Ida B. Wells established and participated in numerous organizations that supported people of color such as the Alpha Suffrage club, which was the first black female suffrage association in Chicago.

The Civil Right movement was a broad and diverse effort to attain racial equality, compelled to the nation to live up to its ideal that all are created equal. The movement demonstrated that ordinary men and women could perform extraordinary acts of courage and sacrifice to achieve social justice. The event of Brown v. Board of Education and advocates such as Thurgood Marshall and Rosa Parks greatly impacted the United States. Thurgood Marshall applied to the university of Maryland Law school, however he was turned down because he was and African American. Therefore he decided to go to Howard’s University an all black historical school.

Bernice Barnett in her writings points out the blatant lack of recognition and absence from history, of the many and determinant contributions Black African American Women offered both to the Civil Rights Movement and to Women’s rights as a whole. Barnett illustrates this through the examples of some Southern Heroines she noted in her work. These women namely, “Septima Poinsette Clark, McCree Harris, Shirley Sherrod, Diane Nash, Johnnie Carr, Thelma Glass, Georgia Gilmore, and JoAnn Robinson” (Barnett, 1993). These women were known to stand side by side with other pioneer of the civil rights, yet they nevertheless were omitted from history as was their significance of the time.

Jordan African World Survey 12:30 Dr.Watts Findings After completing episode 5 of the P.B.S. “The African Americans Many Rivers to Cross” I was able to learn new interesting facts about the Civil War. I was surprised at the different events, people and organizations that I became aware of that I hadn’t been taught about during high school. Before completing episode 5 of “The African Americans Many Rivers to Cross” my knowledge of the Civil War seemed repeatedly and limited. I had always heard of the same stories about Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Park being the Civil Rights movement leaders but, never about Ella Baker. I remember hearing about different organizations

Josephine Baker an amazing vocal opponent of segregation and discrimination, often initiating one-women protests against racial justice. She dealt with alot when she was younger from being burned out of her home to being so frightened and running away, she was beaten just for the things she continued to do and to say the things she said just because she didn't like the rules and laws of segregation. Josephine ran away multiple times but when she ran away to another country she could do anything she wanted she felt like she was equal to everyone. She was a person who not only just wanting to fight for blacks but for all she wanted to do anything with all races all color because she felt like we all was put on this earth and we all suppose