StudentShare
Contact Us
Sign In / Sign Up for FREE
Search
Go to advanced search...

The events that produced the modern Civil Rights Movement - Essay Example

Cite this document
Summary
The modern civil rights movement in America spanned the late 1950's until the 1970's and essentially reenacted the various aims of the original civil rights movement, known as the Reconstruction, after the American Civil War. There were various factors at play that eventually united African-Americans into the struggle for their own rights, freedoms and social status free of discrimination, and primary among these are the murder of 14 year old Emmitt Till, the Montgomery Bus Boycott launched by Rosa Parks and the activism and subsequent murder of Martin Luther King Jr…
Download full paper File format: .doc, available for editing
GRAB THE BEST PAPER96.8% of users find it useful
The events that produced the modern Civil Rights Movement
Read Text Preview

Extract of sample "The events that produced the modern Civil Rights Movement"

Download file to see previous pages

The case has never been perfectly clear, but it seems that Till had told several of his African-American friends in Mississippi that back home in Chicago he had a white girlfriend - they did not believe him and so dared him to speak to a white woman while out in public. Whether Till actually spoke, or whether he whistled at a married white woman while in a grocery store in unclear, but the repercussions are unambiguous (Ownby 151). The boy was murdered because of his apparent audacity in addressing a white woman, and the death shocked people all over the country.

Mere months later, Rosa Parks found lasting fame and reverence because of her refusal to give up her seat on a city bus to a white passenger. At this time, segregation existed on buses and an African-American was not allowed to take the front seat of a bus, particularly if there was a white passenger who needed to sit down. Parks' civil disobedience led to the formation of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which lasted for months and ultimately culminated in the 1956 decision of Alabama courts to rule that bus segregation is unconstitutional.

Parks was always the first to downplay her role in the modern civil rights movement, but the truth is that her disregard for discriminatory practices influenced the entire African-American population to rethink their own attitudes towards segregation and low social standing (Burns 87-90). Following the murder of Emmitt Till, African-Americans were, on the whole, very angry, frightened and confused about what steps needed to be taken to ensure their future safety and success in the nation. Rosa Parks unwittingly gave all these disenfranchised people a look at how simple individual protest could be used to really make a difference where it mattered the most.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott not only influenced a nation, but it specifically had a great effect on someone who would prove to be an invaluable member of the modern civil rights movement: Martin Luther King Jr. King Jr. took a leadership role in the Bus Boycott and from this starting point became an omnipresent figure in most aspects of the African-American civil rights movement in America. His most famed contribution to the movement was his "I Have a Dream" speech, delivered in 1963 during the March on Washington.

King envisioned a time when society would welcome its diverse people together as one, treat every person as both an individual and an equal, and put an end to discrimination and segregation laws in America and worldwide (Ralph Jr. 29-36). The ideals and actions of Martin Luther King Jr. were essentially fundamental to the modern civil rights movement and because of this, African-Americans were ultimately inspired to take up the causes he fought for after he was murdered in Tennessee in 1968.

The death of this great leader of the civil rights movement was a great shock to the entire country, but it was in many ways the final catalyst that African-Americans needed to realize that enough was enough in terms of discrimination and

...Download file to see next pages Read More
Cite this document
  • APA
  • MLA
  • CHICAGO
(“The events that produced the modern Civil Rights Movement Essay”, n.d.)
The events that produced the modern Civil Rights Movement Essay. Retrieved from https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1524556-the-events-that-produced-the-modern-civil-rights-movement
(The Events That Produced the Modern Civil Rights Movement Essay)
The Events That Produced the Modern Civil Rights Movement Essay. https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1524556-the-events-that-produced-the-modern-civil-rights-movement.
“The Events That Produced the Modern Civil Rights Movement Essay”, n.d. https://studentshare.org/miscellaneous/1524556-the-events-that-produced-the-modern-civil-rights-movement.
  • Cited: 0 times

CHECK THESE SAMPLES OF The events that produced the modern Civil Rights Movement

The Role of Mass Movement in the World Politics

These include the Non-Cooperation Movement inspired and led by Mohandas 'Mahatma' Gandhi in the 1920s (Bakshi, 1988; Brown, 2009), The African-American civil rights movement which operated between 1955 and 1968, and later on gave birth to the Black Power movement (McAdam, 2009), Stephen Biko's Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa (Gerhart, 1978), the Anti-Vietnam War Movement in the United States (DeBenedetti and Chatfield, 1990), also the 1989 velvet and colour revolutions in Eastern Europe (Sorin and Tismaneanu, 2000), and the so-called 'Orange Revolution' in Ukraine that followed the 2004 presidential election, etc....
10 Pages (2500 words) Essay

Sex workers in Brazil

Making it Work: The Prostitutes 'rights movement in Perspective.... Projects in Brazil Highlighting the Position of Sex Workers In the 1990s, the Prostitution and civil rights Program sponsored the Brazilian Prostitute's Network and fought against violence and stigma against sex workers.... This was in a bid to make civil rights more accessible to them, promote self-determination and build self-esteem.... The prostitute movement argues that in the same way health was transformed into a state obligation and a right for every citizen, without privileges and prejudices, so should prostitution....
3 Pages (750 words) Essay

Historical events that have shaped America

Not only did it spawn a philosophy of good government and a view of human rights that directly impacted the thinking of the Founding Fathers as they crafted the American system of government, but it also indirectly informed modern views of social justice that precipitated such developments as the civil rights movement, universal suffrage, and social security.... The number of historical events that have shaped America into the country it has become today is immense....
5 Pages (1250 words) Essay

The Theory of Crime Prevention

The author states that the question of losing privacy, dignity and civil rights is the matter for sociologists and mainly for the government and lawmakers to decide.... It is necessary to build a safe society for the people to live and losing some of their civil rights might not worry the needy much....
8 Pages (2000 words) Term Paper

Theories on Social Movement

People mobilize, leadership develops, duties are assigned, the public is notified, and guidelines or strategies begin to form, resulting finally in the establishment of the movement (Polletta & Jasper, 2001, 283).... Proactive social movements that aspire to reform a particular feature of human conduct, like the Women's Christian Temperance movement, are transformative (Polletta & Jasper, 2001, 283); those aspiring for an absolute transformation of individual conduct, like religious fundamentalist groups, are liberating (p....
15 Pages (3750 words) Essay

Malcolm Gladwells Ideas and Philosophy in The Tipping Point

Measuring merely by the weight of popular support and enthusiastic participation evinced by the movement, it could be equated with the civil rights movement and the Women's Rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s respectively.... It is an interesting exercise to study how the most important social movement of recent times - Occupy Wall Street movement (OWS) – measures up in relation to the author's theories.... The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement witnessed in recent years is one of the most significant socio-political events to have taken place in the history of the United States of America....
7 Pages (1750 words) Essay

Emergence of the modern civil rights movement 1950s

Surprisingly, some whites also joined in to support this movement.... The activism advocated for equal rights and fair treatment of all human beings regardless of color and race.... Consequently, they decided to join hands and fight for what they viewed as their rights.... The two believed there was the hindrance to the rights they deserved.... The civil right movements' formation was caused by the brunt of segregation and the backlash that African American faced....
9 Pages (2250 words) Research Paper

Human Trafficking and Raising Awareness of the Anti Trafficking Movement

hellip; The present research has identified that human trafficking is clearly, slavery practiced in the modern day.... The anti-trafficking movement's goal is to fight against all forms of exploitation of migrants.... The movement especially focuses on the severe human rights violations that trafficked persons suffer.... The movement seeks to build the global presence and individual commitment by strengthening the capacities of its partners in the civil society and government....
6 Pages (1500 words) Research Paper
sponsored ads
We use cookies to create the best experience for you. Keep on browsing if you are OK with that, or find out how to manage cookies.
Contact Us