Gwen Ifill, Time
- The first time I ever used the term post-civil rights to describe the new generation of African-American politicians I was studying, the Rev. Joseph Lowery hollered at me. He wanted to know, What in the devil does that mean?
I have to admit that I had no good answer for the 86-year-old civil rights icon as we stood backstage last year at a banquet honoring the 50th anniversary of the integration of Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas. Perhaps because it has been so meteoric, Barack Obama’s ascendancy has made us lazy about our history and lazy about the language we use to describe our past as well as our present. The commentary is often breathless: It’s the end of black politics, we declare. It’s the beginning of black politics, we assert. It’s the transformation of black politics, we decide.
That last description comes closest to being right. The Martin Luther King-era wave of activism Lowery helped lead was about demanding access to lunch counters, schoolhouse doors and voting booths, and accountability in the town squares that were the sites of lynchings and protests.
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