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THE BLACKQUAKER PROJECT: a Quaker program dedicated to examining, celebrating, preserving, and presenting the contributions and experiences of Black Quakers throughout the world.
Current activities include:
1. BOOK: Publishing BLACKFIRE: BLACK QUAKERS ON SPIRITUALITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS, an anthology. Editors: Paul Kriese, Steve Angell, and Hal Weaver (initiating editor). Status: most materials collected, working with FGC Publications Committee. SEE PROPOSAL BELOW. Contact: weaverhal@yahoo.com
2. PLAY: Developing a play YOU DON’T HAVE TO RIDE JIM CROW, utilizing the writings and music of Bayard Rustin. Status: first draft completed. Chris King, dramatist, and HW. Contact: cristolking@cs.com
3. ORAL HISTORY: Interviewing and preserving the experiences, thoughts, and feelings of seasoned Friends of African descent who might not be alive much longer. Status: in planning, needs resources. (Unfortunately, Elders MAHALA ASHLEY DICKERSON (Alaska) and CHARLES NICHOLS (Providence, RI) died in early 2007 after the conceptualization—but not the implementation--of this planned activity. So there is an urgency about moving ahead with appropriate support).
4. DIALOGUE: Interacting with—and facilitating communication between--Quakers in Africa and the African Diaspora. Developing projects of mutual concern and interest. Status: In active development with Friends from Africa, Europe, and the USA
5. OUTREACH: Providing information and training to educational and cultural institutions and Quaker Meetings (Monthly, Quarterly, and Yearly). Status: In active development: offering weekend course at Pendle Hill on Bayard Rustin and Paul Robeson (4/2007), researching quotations of African American Quakers for the revised FAITH AND PRACTICE, New England Yearly Meeting (NEYM) (WMM/MORE: Lyn Danforth, Sarah Chase, HW) Fall 2007), offering a second hour at Wellesley Meeting (“Freedom…”) commemorating the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade in the British Empire (3/25/2007), offering a second hour at Wellesley Meeting on the 2007 FWCC triennial and Friends worldwide (11/30/2007), delivering the Weed Lecture at Beacon Hill Friends House, Boston (4/13/2008).
6. QUAKERS AND CHATTEL SLAVERY IN THE AMERICAS. Research and oral and written presentations in the Americas, Europe, and elsewhere on the various points of view of Friends vis-à-vis chattel enslavement, abolition, compensation, retrospective justice, et al. There major thrusts: (1) COMPREHENSIVE EDUCATION PROGRAM inside and outside the Religious Society of Friends, (2) MAJOR COMMITMENT TO REDRESSING PAST INJUSTICES, EXPLOITATION, SUFFERING, HUMILIATION, AND DEHUMANIZATION: A PLAN FOR RETROSPECTIVE JUSTICE inside and out side the Society of Friends, and (3) advocacy for a new JUSTICE TESTIMONY within the Society of Friends, beginning in NEYM.
PROJECT CONTACT: Dr. Hal Weaver weaverhal@yahoo.com --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WORKING DRAFT/ 26 Oct 2007, Blue Mountain Center, NY. FOR DISCUSSION ONLY.
BLACK FIRE: BLACK QUAKERS ON SPIRITUALITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS—Book
Black Quakers, over half the world’s Quakers, have made major contributions to society, culture, education, life, science, polity, economy for over 200 years. Yet there is little known about their collective writings, let alone their identity or identification as Quakers. Not one book anthologizing the writings of this majority segment of the Religious Society of Friends has ever been published.
This one-volume, 300-page anthology would help fill that gap. It will feature writings by some of the most inspirational and influential Quaker thinkers, writers, and activists of the twentieth century: JEAN TOOMER, BAYARD RUSTIN, HOWARD THURMAN, IRA REID, and others of great renown. There is documentation indicating that many Black Quaker national achievers were not widely known even among Friends as being Friends This volume will also include writings by pioneering Black Friends in the earlier 18th and 19th centuries: philanthropist-abolitionist PAUL CUFFE, self-taught scientist-mathematician-publisher BENJAMIN BANNEKER, activist-educator SARAH MAPP DOUGLASS (ancestor of 20th century artist-activist-scholar PAUL ROBESON), and others. The volume will provide succinct writings on spirituality and human rights in the context of the commitment of important Black Quakers to both the Society of Friends and to the wider society, national and international.
Nearly all the contributors were members of the Society of Friends; in three cases, the writers had “living ties” with the Society through their activities and actions (AFSC activist BILL SUTHERLAND, theologian-prolific-Friends-United-Press author HOWARD THURMAN, and scientist-inventor BENJAMIN BANNEKER, a regular attender.) We are especially grateful to Kenneth Ives’s edited book (out of print), BLACK QUAKERS, as a starting reference for our anthology. Based on further research, we have added the names of other women and men: pioneers MAHALA ASHLEY DICKERSON, BILL SUTHERLAND, ESTHER MOMBO, CHARLES NICHOLS, and HOWARD THURMAN, all of whom have made major contributions to writing about human rights or spirituality or both.
United by literary quality, contributors in this anthology focus on (1) spirituality, (2) human rights, and/or (3) the relationship between the two. Most writers have made significant contributions to the Society of Friends and/or to the broader USA and international society, culture, and civilization. The anthology would fill blind spots in Quaker literature and studies, potentially making a significant contribution to Quaker Studies, African American Studies, religious studies, and equality/racial-justice studies at universities, secondary schools, and Monthly, Quarterly, and Yearly Meetings throughout the USA, Africa, Europe, Asia, and even Latin America, were a translation to be forthcoming at a later date.
The writings will draw upon published works and historical archives. Among the Quaker publishers of pamphlets, articles, poetry, and books selected are Pendle Hill, “Friends Intelligencer,” Friends United Press, FGC, and Philadelphia and New York Yearly Meetings, as well as unpublished American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) memoranda and other materials from such peace organizations as the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR). The Archives at Earlham, Swarthmore, and Haverford Colleges have been especially good sources of documents, published and unpublished. The editors will obtain permission for reprinting copyrighted material.
The impact of [Black] spirituality and religion on human rights, including the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950’s and 1960’s, is indisputable. It has been documented by numerous scholars and writers, Black and White. What did BAYARD RUSTIN and HOWARD THURMAN contribute? How are spirituality and the search for self poetically and aesthetically explored by JEAN TOOMER in the writings representing his various lives? What was TOOMER’s pioneering literary and artistic contribution to the Harlem Renaissance?
What did Black Quaker social scientists, humanists, and activists contribute to Quaker and social-science literature? What did my renowned Haverford sociology professor and advisor IRA REID and my Rutgers colleague VERA GREEN contribute? What contributions did the frequently quoted public intellectual-activist BAYARD RUSTIN make to the evolutionary shift “from protest to politics?” How about AFSC activist BILL SUTHERLAND, for whom the AFSC Bill Sutherland Institute Training is named? What did SUTHERLAND bring to the evolving operational definitions of non-violence and violence in the struggle for freedom in Africa? For DWIGHT WILSON: “How Important is the Justice Testimony?”(in Linda Hill Renfer, ed., DAILY READINGS FROM QUAKER WRITINGS, ANCIENT AND MODERN, Grants Pass, OR: Serenity Press, 1988, p. 289)
The Black-Studies movement in the USA was the intellectual and academic manifestation of the Black freedom movement, both north and south. What were key writings by CHARLES NICHOLS that might have inspired and benefited scholarship in the Academy that was not Euro-centric? What impact did words (his letters to Thomas Jefferson and Moses Brown) and deeds of PAUL CUFFE have on the abolitionist movement against chattel slavery, on the Back-to-Africa movement, and on the construction of Quaker Meeting Houses in New England? REID (Haverford), with the initiative of the AFSC, and then NICHOLS (Brown) were in the vanguard of African American scholars and professors desegregating the faculties at northern colleges and universities.
Black Quakers have made their mark in writings in the natural and physical sciences, the social sciences, and the arts and humanities on spirituality and the struggle for human dignity and human rights.
BIOS: Ten (10)* might be selected from the following sixteen (16) women and men:
BENJAMIN BANNEKER (1731-1804). Publisher, landowner, self-educated inventor, mathematician, scientist, and farmer. Commissioned by Thomas Jefferson to participate in surveying and laying out the nation’s capitol. Attender BYM (DC).
PAUL CUFFE (1759-1818). Human-rights activist, abolitionist, entrepreneur, ship owner/captain, philanthropist, Back-to-Africa leader for enslaved and newly “freed” Africans. NEYM
SARAH MAPPS DOUGLASS (1806-1882). Teacher, outspoken critic of Quaker segregation of African Americans in Meeting Houses. PYM
JEAN TOOMER (1894-1946). Poet, essayist, novelist, life-long seeker, pioneering Harlem-Renaissance writer. Monthly and Yearly Meeting leader. PYM
HOWARD THURMAN (1900-1981). Theologian, philosopher, educator, minister, prolific author, and preacher. Major works published by Friends United Press, Pendle Hill, et al.
IRA REID (1901-1968). Sociologist, authority on race relations, labor/employment, and immigration. Haverford College faculty desegregator. Widely published scholar. PYM. BARRINGTON DUNBAR (1901-1978). Social scientist, Quaker activist, namesake of the NYYM Black Development fund. NYYM
HELEN MORGAN BROOKS (1904(?)-1989.Poet, teacher. PYM
BAYARD RUSTIN (1910-1987. Human-rights leader, activist, mobilizer, organizer. Public intellectual. Works published by PYM et al. Leonard Kenworthy on Rustin: “No Quaker in recent times has been so effective …in a wide range of movements and organizations for human betterment.” NYYM.
MAHALA ASHLEY DICKERSON (c.1912-2007. Lawyer, human-rights activist/leader in Alabama and Alaska, philanthropist for Quaker causes. Land grantee in Alaska, donating some property to the Alaska Friends Conference (AFC). BYM, AFC. CHARLES NICHOLS (1918-2007). Pioneering scholar: slave narratives on USA chattel slavery. Pioneering American Studies professor in Europe and, like REID at Haverford, pioneering professor in desegregating northern universities. NEYM.
BILL SUTHERLAND (1918-) Long-time AFSC activist, advisor to African political leadership. His important co-authored book, GUNS AND GANDHI IN AFRICA, states: ”Our main concerns have been the overwhelmingly structural and institutional roots of conflict—such as racism, sexism, and capitalism—which in themselves constitute the greatest violence of of our times.” (p. 16). (Reference to “satyagraha…soul force.”) Self-proclaimed “Quaker fellow traveler.”
VERA GREEN (1928-1982). Anthropologist. Pioneering short study on Friends of African Descent—why they do and do not join the Society of Friends. NYYM
DWIGHT SPANN WILSON (-). Former General Secretary, FGC, now Head, Friends School of Detroit. Wrote provocative piece, QUAKER AND BLACK: ANSWERING THE CALL OF MY TWIN ROOTS. LEYM
ESTHER MOMBO (- alive).Kenyan theologian . Academic Dean of St Paul’s United Theological College, Kenya. Ph.D. from University of Edinburgh, Scotland. Woodbrooke (UK) pamphlet based on dissertation on Quaker theology in East Africa. Writing and lecture specialties: women’s issues, evangelism, poverty, Christian-Muslim relations, and HIV/AIDS.
Note: One African, non-American, female Kenyan is to be included (1) to demonstrate that Black Quakers are eclectic and international [Kenya has the largest number of Quakers of any country in the world], (2) to whet the appetite for a projected volume II on Quakers outside the USA, and (3) to give a better ratio of women to men in this anthology. A volume III could also deal with the proliferation of writings by currently living USA Black Quakers whose works are not included in this volume.
* Those not given a separate section in the anthology will be integrated into the Introduction. It is possible that living Black Quakers might be held over for a future volume. We seek advice on this idea.
EDITORS: Academicians and long-term scholars on Quakerism and African Americans DR. PAUL KRIESE (Indiana University/Richmond) and DR. STEVE ANGELL (Earlham/ESR) are joining the initiating editor DR. HAROLD (HAL) WEAVER (Harvard) in this collaborative venture of The BlackQuaker Project, a Quaker program dedicated to examining, celebrating, preserving, and presenting the contributions and experiences of Black Quakers throughout the world.
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