The Revolutionary Syllabus

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A Chicago Area Friends of SNCC History reading list by Theodore R. Foster III, PhD

• The River of No Return: The Autobiography of a Black Militant and the Life and Death of SNCC; Cleveland Sellers with Robert Terrell
• Black Power Speech; Stokely Carmichael/Kwame Ture
  • In this speech, Stokely Carmichael/Kwame Ture references Lawrence Landry who is central to the 1963 Chicago Public Schools boycott and the coalition of Black organizations that came together under the CCCO (Coordinating Council of Community Organizations)

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A Black Power reading list from rapper and librarian Roy Kinsey

• Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents; Isabel Wilkerson
• Assata: An Autobiography; Assata Shakur
• Sisters of the Yam: Black Women and Self Recovery; bell hooks
• The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration; Isabel Wilkerson
• All About Love; bell hooks
• Black Skin, White Masks; Frantz Fanon
• The Autobiography of Malcolm X; Malcom X
• Paradise; Toni Morrison
• The Will To Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love; bell hooks
• The Fire Next Time; James Baldwin
• Pedagogy of the Oppressed; Paulo Friere

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A short story from artist, educator, and musician Damon Locks

• Jump, Cadwell Turnbull

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A Civil Rights Freedom Fighters reading list from Fannie Rushing, PhD

• I‘ve Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition and the Mississippi Freedom Struggle; Charles M. Payne
• Black Power: The Politics of Liberation in America; Kwame Ture and Charles V. Hamilton
• Stokely Carmichael: The Story of Black Power (History of the Civil Rights Movement); Jacqueline Johnson
• Ready for Revolution: The Life and Struggles of Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture); Stokely Carmichael and Ekwueme Michael Thelwell
• The Making of Black Revolutionaries; James Forman
• This Little Light of Mine: The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer; Kay Mills
• Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement: A Radical Democratic Vision; Barbara Ransby
• Many Minds, One Heart: SNCC’S Dream for a New America; Wesley C. Hogan

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An Education/Liberation reading list from Court’s Education Department

• Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist; Judith Heumann 
• Cultivating Genius: An Equity Framework for Culturally and Historically Responsive Literacy; Gholdy Muhammad 
• Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain: Promoting Authentic Engagement and Rigor Among Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students; Zaretta Hammond 
• The Dreamkeepers: Successful Teachers of African American Children; Gloria Ladson-Billings 
• Onward: Cultivating Emotional Resilience in Educators; Elena Aguilar 
• Punished for Dreaming: How School Reform Harms Black Children and How We Heal; Bettina L. Love 
• Take Care of Yourself: The Art and Cultures of Care and Liberation; Sundus Abdul Hadi 
• Teaching When the World is On Fire; Lisa Delpit 
• Unearthing Joy: A Guide to Culturally and Historically Responsive Teaching and Learning; Gholdy Muhammad 
• Viral Justice: How We Grow The World We Want; Ruha Benjamin 
• We Got This. Equity, Access, and the Quest to Be Who Our Students Need Us to Be; Cornelius Minor 
• We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom; Bettina L. Love

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Watch Curtis Hayes Muhammed Presente!, recommended by Theodore R. Foster III, PhD

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Watch this selection of films and clips recommended by artist, educator, and musician Damon Locks

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Watch this selection of films and clips recommended by rapper and librarian Roy Kinsey

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Watch Fundi: The Life of Ella Baker, a film by Joanne Grant, recommended by Fannie Rushing, PhD

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This episode of the AirGo podcast focuses on the creative process behind Stokely: The Unfinished Revolution.

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Listen to these songs and speeches recommended by rapper and librarian Roy Kinsey

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AirGo Radio is a weekly podcast based in Chicago that reshapes the culture of the city and beyond for the more liberatory and creative. Through longform conversations with movement workers, artists, rappers, poets, musicians, organizers, and changemakers, AirGo puts Chicago’s reimaginers in conversation and creates a living dialogue-based archive of our creative communities and social movements. AirGo is the flagship show of Respair Production & Media, an ecosystem hub creating and supporting the media needed to reshape culture toward liberation. and is a sponsored project of Allied Media Projects. Learn more.

Dr. Theodore Foster III, PhD is a Black Studies scholar specializing in the production of historical memories of the modern civil rights movement, Black visual culture, and neoliberalism within Black political thought. His research focuses on how memorials, commemorations, activists, politicians, and artists visualize and narrate the history of the 1960s Black Freedom Movement through divergent political lenses. Dr. Foster is an Assistant Professor of African American History and Black Studies at University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

Roy Kinsey is an anomaly when it comes to tradition in his respective industries. Where being a Black, queer-identified, rapper, and librarian may be an intimidating choice for some, Roy Kinsey’s non-conformist ideology has informed his poignant releases, BLACKIE: A Story by Roy Kinsey, Kinsey: A Memoir, and most recently 3 RINGS. Gracing the covers of prominent publications like Chicago Reader, Chicago Tribune, Billboard, LA Times, NPR, WBEZ’s Vocalo, and WGCI to name a few, this coverage proves that Kinsey’s goal to preserve rap as a literary art form resonates. His contributions are offerings to the canon of Black queer literature and hip-hop. Learn more.

Damon Locks is a Chicago-based visual artist, educator, and vocalist/musician. Since 2014, he has been working with the Prison and Neighborhood Arts Project at the Stateville Correctional Center teaching art. He spent four years as an Artist in Residence as a part of the Museum of Contemporary Art’s SPACE Program, introducing civically engaged art into the curriculum at Sarah E. Goode STEM Academy High School. He currently teaches Improvisation in the Sound Department at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Damon leads the Black Monument Ensemble; is a member of New Future City Radio and Exploding Star Orchestra; and co-founder of the band The Eternals.

Fannie Theresa Rushing, PhD is a founding member of the Chicago Area Friends of SNCC and served as a SNCC field secretary and Freedom School teacher from 1962 to 1966. Her major contributions to the Chicago SNCC History Project Archives at the Vivian G. Harsh Research Collection document the civil rights movement in Chicago and the American South, and her involvement in international human rights work. Dr. Rushing is a professor at Benedictine University.

Court’s Education Department – meet the team!

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