Description
Book SynopsisExamines how specific Party chapters or offshoots emerged, developed, and waned, as well as how the local branches related to their communities and to the national party. This work reveals how Black Panther Party ideologies, goals, and strategies were taken up and adapted throughout the United States.
Trade Review“Students of American and African American history will find
Liberated Territory enlightening and instructive for illuminating the history of a widely understudied and commonly misconstrued organization. The five essays advance the momentum for continued scholarly research on Black Power’s local impact, which is essential for a better understanding of the movement’s diverse character and national appeal.” - Karen M. Hawkins,
North Carolina Historical Review“Yohuru Williams and Jama Lazerow and their contributors challenge the conventional narrative of the 1960s that focuses predominantly on the liberal civil rights movement, to the exclusion of the radical black power movement, and either evades any discussion of the Black Panther party (BPP) or portrays the organization negatively. . . . These narratives demonstrate the importance of local circumstances in Panther history. . . .
Liberated Territory makes an important contribution to the growing scholarship on the Black Panther party.”
- Floyd W. Hayes III,
Journal of American History“Anyone interested in the BPP, or in Black Power activism in overlooked places such as Birmingham, will learn a great deal from
Liberated Territory.” - Hasan Kwame Jeffries,
The Alabama Review“
Liberated Territory helps to decenter the Oakland top-down approach to studying the Black Panther Party by critically engaging with the stories of rank and file party members in locations far beyond Oakland. Yohuru Williams and Jama Lazerow have produced a collection that will quickly become a model for others to emulate.”—
Sundiata Keita Cha-Jua, author of
America’s First Black Town: Brooklyn, Illinois, 1830–1915“
Liberated Territory is a very impressive anthology. Its focus on the local histories of the Black Panther Party helps to fill a yawning gap in scholarship and adds to the expanding corpus of innovative scholarship on the black power movement. By developing a broader understanding of the party’s local chapters, people, and politics, the essays shed light on the provincial nature of the party while providing important context for understanding the national organization.”—
Jeffrey O. G. Ogbar, author of
Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity“Anyone interested in the BPP, or in Black Power activism in overlooked places such as Birmingham, will learn a great deal from
Liberated Territory.” -- Hasan Kwame Jeffries * Alabama Review *
“Students of American and African American history will find
Liberated Territory enlightening and instructive for illuminating the history of a widely understudied and commonly misconstrued organization. The five essays advance the momentum for continued scholarly research on Black Power’s local impact, which is essential for a better understanding of the movement’s diverse character and national appeal.” -- Karen M. Hawkins * North Carolina Historical Review *
“Yohuru Williams and Jama Lazerow and their contributors challenge the conventional narrative of the 1960s that focuses predominantly on the liberal civil rights movement, to the exclusion of the radical black power movement, and either evades any discussion of the Black Panther party (BPP) or portrays the organization negatively. . . . These narratives demonstrate the importance of local circumstances in Panther history. . . .
Liberated Territory makes an important contribution to the growing scholarship on the Black Panther party.”
-- Floyd W. Hayes III * Journal of American History *
Table of ContentsIntroduction. From Oakland to Omaha: Historicizing the Panthers / Yohuru Williams 1
1. Bringing the Black Panther Party Back In: A Survey / Jama Lazerow and Yohuru Williams 33
2. The Black Panthers at the Water's Edge: Oakland, Boston, and the New Bedford "Riots" of 1970 / Jama Lazerow 85
3. "The Power Belongs to Us and We Belong to the Revolutionary Age": The Alabama Black Liberation Front and the Long Reach of the Black Panther Party / Robert W. Widell Jr. 136
4. Marching Blind: The Rise and Fall of the Black Panther Party in Detroit / Ahmad A. Rahman 181
5. "Give Them a Cause to Die For": The Black Panther Party in Milwaukee, 1969-77 / Yohuru Williams 232
Epilogue. The Black Panther Party in the Disunited States of America: Constitutionalism, Watergate, and the Closing of the Americanists' Minds / Devin Fergus 265
Contributors 295
Index 297
