The role of women in the Civil Rights Movement



The role of women in the Civil Rights Movement

Introduction

The African American Civil Rights Movement continued for the period 1896-1954. Throughout the movement, women played important roles not only for the cause of getting rights for themselves but also to get the civil rights such as social, economical, political and legal rights. However, the roles of women in such movements have been largely overlooked by the historians who just wrote about the roles of participating organizations and their leaders, who were mostly the men. Since 1980's, some of the female historians have started finding the facts about the roles in civil rights and black power movement; thus the efforts of women in such movement have started coming to light. This essay describes the difficulties faced by the black people, the role of women throughout the African American Civil Rights Movement, the goals they accomplished, and the black power movement.

Discussion

During the civil right movement of African Americans, the women served the role of intermediate leadership layer, which is essential for providing strength and support to any social movement. The women actively participated in the civil right movement, starting from the late nineteenth century. It is to be noted that the women did not fight for the cause of getting rights for themselves, but they also raise their voice so that black people could get the same social, legal, economical, and political benefits, which were practiced by American people. The following section describes some of the major difficulties faced by the African Americans, due to which they were forced to initiate the social movements.

Major Problems of African American History

African American people were tired of facing the racial discrimination not only for the politics, but for nearly every area of life. They faced workplace discriminations, differences in the quality of health care and education they received, different and low standards of housing and many more. In addition, these people also had to face the brutality from the Police. Many of the Black people served as servants of white Americans, and their conditions were even worse as compared to the free Black people. The lives of the free black people who lived in the states where slavery was legally prohibited were far better than those who live in the states where slavery was allowed. In the latter ones, mostly the black people were not allowed to own their lands, to travel freely, and even to attend the prayers as there was a risk of rebellion if the slave would have come to communication with these black people. In most of the states, black people were not even allowed to vote or to educate their children. If we look at the historic situation of American states, we come to know that the city practiced extreme inequality between the rights and facilities of white and black people. Even the cities' buses were not exempted from the unequal rights for black and white ...