Faith and Struggle in the Lives of Four African Americans: Ethel Waters, Mary Lou Williams, Eldridge Cleaver, and Muhammad Ali

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In 1964, Muhammad Ali said of his decision to join the Nation of Islam: I know where Im going and I know the truth and I dont have to be what you want me to be. Im free to be what I want to be. This sentiment, the brash assertion of individual freedom, informs and empowers each of the four personalities profiled in this book. Randal Maurice Jelks shows that to understand the Black American experience beyond the larger narratives of enslavement, emancipation, and Black Lives Matter, we need to hear the individual stories. Drawing on his own experiences growing up as a religious African American, he shows that the inner history of Black Americans in the 20th century is a story worthy of telling. This book explores the faith stories of four African Americans: Ethel Waters, Mary Lou Williams, Eldridge Cleaver, and Muhammad Ali. It examines their autobiographical writings, interviews, speeches, letters, and memorable performances to understand how each of these figures used religious faith publicly to reconcile deep personal struggles, voice their concerns for human dignity, and reinvent their public image. For them, liberation was not simply defined by material or legal wellbeing, but by a spiritual search for community and personal wholeness.

Reviews

[Faith and Struggle in the Lives of Four African Americans] offers a fascinating look into the religious lives of four individuals, and Jelks also weaves his own religious narrative in and out of the stories he tells. * Anxious Bench *

Author Bio

Randal Maurice Jelks is Professor of American Studies and African and African American Studies at the University of Kansas, USA. His previous books are both award-winning: African Americans in the Furniture City: The Struggle for Civil Rights Struggle in Grand Rapids (2006) and Benjamin Elijah Mays, Schoolmaster of the Movement: A Biography (2012).