Category: killers of the dream

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Martin Luther King, Jr. and Lillian E. Smith: Part II

On March 10, 1956, Lillian Smith wrote a letter to Martin Luther King, Jr. She told him how much she admired his work and how she thought that King’s approach would be successful. She tells King that she would like to have the opportunity to meet him, and she offers her encouragement to the movement. Along with all of this, Smith also noted, as … Read More Martin Luther King, Jr. and Lillian E. Smith: Part II

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Martin Luther King, Jr. and Lillian E. Smith: Part I

On February 4, 1968, two months before his assassination, Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered “The Drum Major Instinct” at Ebenezer Baptist Church. During the sermon, King pointed out that the drum major instinct can lead to “tragic race prejudice.” On this point, he continued, “Many have written about this problem—Lillian Smith used to say it beautifully in some of her books. And she would … Read More Martin Luther King, Jr. and Lillian E. Smith: Part I

LES Center Videos: II

Last post, I shared some of the brief videos I have made for Twitter. These videos are for the Lillian E. Smith Center’s profile, and each video focuses on some aspect of Smith’s work, usually connecting it to other authors and artists. Today, I want to share a few more of these videos. I will include the scripts I wrote and the videos. Make … Read More LES Center Videos: II

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The “historical self” and the “self self”: Part II

In last Thursday’s post, I wrote about the “historical self” and the “self self” that Claudia Rankine references in one of the vignettes in Citizen: An American Lyric. Today, I want to finish that discussion by looking some more at Rankine’s work, Lillian Smith, and concluding with Jamaica Kincaid’s A Small Place.

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The “historical self” and the “self self”: Part I

Last post, I wrote about the ways that racism, subjugation, and history imprisons everyone, the oppressed and the oppressor alike. Today, I want to continue that discussion by looking at Lillian Smith’s Killers of the Dream and connected her discussion with a couple of the vignettes in Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric. While Smith focuses, predominately, on the white psyche, Rankine focuses on … Read More The “historical self” and the “self self”: Part I