Black Prophetic Fire

In this surprising series of discussions, Cornel West, with Christa Buschendorf, provides a fresh perspective on revolutionary African American leaders: Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. Du Bois, Martin Luther King, Jr., Ella Baker, Malcolm X, and Ida B. Wells-Barnett. West examines what these black leaders meant to the people of their eras, how their legacies are felt today, and what present-day leaders and activists, including West himself, have learned from these men and women. By returning to these passionate advocates of social justice, West not only rediscovers the incredible drive within them, but also their fault lines and the diminished fire within the African American community today. In a dialogue with German scholar Christa Buschendorf, West finds Douglas and to some extent Du Bois fall short of the high standards he holds them to, while King has been sanitized and even "Santaclausified" to render him less radical. Through intimate interviews, Buschendorf not only draws West's opinions out, but also pushes against and supplements them with her own scholarship. By revisiting these well-known figures and providing new criticism that humanizes them, West takes an important step in rekindling the black prophetic fire so essential to America's future vitality.