Radio Free Dixie: Robert F. Williams and the Roots of Black Power

Content Warning: The section contains references to racism and racialized violence.

The Black Power movement is a revolutionary branch of the civil rights movement that rose to prominence in the mid-1960s. The generally accepted image of the Black Power movement, which advocates self-sufficiency and Black liberation, frames it as a militant counterculture that is entirely separate from the pacifist civil rights movement associated with figures like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Radio Free Dixie makes the case that this version of events is a sanitized and inaccurate account of history. Tyson argues that the ideological tenets of the eventual Black Power movement existed within the civil rights movement decades before it captured mainstream attention.

Though the term “civil rights movement” can refer to several interludes in the decades-long struggle by African Americans to secure rights and fair treatment, the most popular usage of the term refers to span of time from 1954 to 1968. During this time, landmark legal and social victories were won primarily through non-violent resistance and direct actions such as protests, sit-ins, and boycotts. The civil rights movement reached its popular peak in the 1950s and 1960s.