Want to Start a Revolution?: Radical Women in the Black Freedom Struggle Book

Pushing back against historic erasure and a tendency to merely mention "various women as key participants and note the damage of sexism" (8) - "dominance through mentioning" - this book documents the political, philosophical, intellectual, organizing and activist contributions of several radical women. Moving beyond a discourse of "firsts" (249), it spotlights visionary women who challenged movements to "imagine a different kind of politics," to create alternative paths to freedom, and to expand the struggle.

Along with its efforts to chronicle the contributions of "radical women in the Black Freedom Struggle," to highlight their impact as leaders, organizers, theorists, strategists, intellectual forces, and in a myriad of other ways, the collection pushes the conversation regarding social movements in a broader sense. Writing against "single-game" analysis and those that focus on individual movements/leaders or the rise and fall of organizations/ movements, the collection speaks to continuity between movements. From Vicki Garvin to Shirley Graham Du Bois, from Rosa Parks to Flo Kennedy, the history of radical women of color is a story that transcends boundaries. Whether talking about Garvin's "journey from old left to black liberation and Third Word solidarity" or Shirley Chisholm's presence in multiple types of movements, or Flo Kennedy, Ella Baker, Yuri Kochiyama, and Rosa Parks' presence and influence across various organizations, this collection "resists marking these women as activists defined exclusively within any singular movement," making "visible the ways these black women radicals redefined movement politics" (4-5). The breadth of many decades of activism and organizing, intellectual and creative works, is illustrative of the range of influences. To talk about radical women is to talk multiple points of influence, multiple organizations, and multiple movements.

The book's cover, which shows Rosa Parks holding a picture of Malcolm X speaks to the orientation of the book: a refusal to see the contributions and influences of radical women within the Black Freedom Struggle in a single snapshot. The history is too dynamic. The influences extend beyond a struggle against a single injustice but instead are seen in the intellectual and theoretical impact and the confluence and bridges that existed between communities, organizations and movements.

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