Books

The Human Tradition in the American West (Human Tradition in America)
Alaska Tales
Thomas O. Larkin: A Life of Patriotism and Profit in Old California
Monkey Mountain Madness (Living the West)
Going Away
Home On the Vandevert Ranch
Cidermaster of Rio Oscuro
The Baron, the Logger, the Miner, and Me
So Far from Home: An Army Bride on the Western Frontier, 1865-69
Humbugs and Heroes
Tales from the Saddle: Observations of the Life from a Riding Stable
Elers Koch: Forty Years a Forester
Across the Tracks: A Route 66 Story
Behind the Mountains
A Deliberate Life: A Journey into the Alaskan Wilderness
The Gringo Kid
Bones Incandescent: The Pajarito Journals of Peggy Pond Church
Feelin' Fine
Tales of the Beartooth, Book 2: Cowboys and Dudes
Birds of Sorrow: Notes from a River Junction in Northern New Mexico
The Misty Trail
Wild West Characters
Naming the Winds: A High Plains Apprenticeship
Gyppo Logger (Columbia Northwest Classics)
A Chain of Hands (Washington State University Press Reprint)

I've Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition and the Mississippi Freedom Struggle

Average customer rating:

If you're going to read one book on civil rights, this is it
Brilliance that doesn't blind but illuminates
Read this Book!
Scholarly Writing at Its Best
Who makes history? This book will tell you.

I've Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition and the Mississippi Freedom Struggle
Charles M. Payne
Manufacturer: University of California Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0520251768

Book Description

This momentous work offers a groundbreaking history of the early civil rights movement in the South with new material that situates the book in the context of subsequent movement literature.

Customer Reviews:

If you're going to read one book on civil rights, this is it.......2003-11-15

I'd pair the book with a more nationally-oriented one, such as the Taylor Branch trilogy, which give a better sense of national politics, but Payne's book is both profound and profoundly moving in its depiction of local communities and Ella Baker's "Organizing Tradition", which turns a number of assumptions about the movement on their head. I've read the book a few times with students and never fail to be personally engaged and to have invigorating classes with students. Great, great stuff!

Brilliance that doesn't blind but illuminates.......2002-06-18

I agree with the earlier reviews but I'd like to provide some details about this book's strengths.
First, Payne places the people who made the Mississippi movement at the center the story. He tells the story of both the original local leaders who made it possible for the civil rights movement to happen in Mississippi and the activists who followed their lead in the 1960s.
Second, he extends the time span of the civil rights movement, showing that it would not have been possible without the "organizing tradition" referred to in the subtitle. Payne expertly traces the relationships and linkages between different generations of heroic troublemakers in Mississippi.
Third, he shows that the original radicals, and I mean those who wanted to change Mississippi from its roots, were those who had already challenged the system to achieve personal gain. "Bourgeois" blacks in Mississippi weren't uniformly complacent or fearful. Wisely, Payne does not use this fact to justify any notion of a "talented tenth" that ought to lead the masses.
Fourth, the chapter on Ella Baker is a stunning and riveting account of one heroic troublemaker who didn't receive enough recognition for her efforts.
Fifth, when Payne writes about what we typically consider the civil rights movement, he places you in the midst of the activists and makes you feel their exhileration, exhaustion, frustration, fear, and courage. Scholarly books never have this quality. At the same time, he does this in a historical context and with a critical eye which absolutely illuminate the raw material in a way that first-person and journalistic treatments rarely approach.
For these reasons, and many more, this is clearly the best of many excellent books on the civil rights movement. Some could fault Payne for placing less emphasis on the national and institutional dimensions of the freedom struggle. But, in the case of the black American struggle for freedom, Payne shows us the story begins with, and is carried by, people who tried to change their communities, not their nation.

Read this Book!.......2001-05-18

As a history major, I have various interests. One of my favorite things to study is the civil rights movement. Of all the books that I have seen, few match the caliber of this book. It takes the state of Mississippi (which may be the book's greatest irony)and shows how powerful a grassroots movement such as the civil rights movement can be with the proper forms of leadership. I urge anyone who is interested in learning about the civil rights movement should start with this book!

Scholarly Writing at Its Best.......2000-04-12

Two years ago the author taught a short course at my college on the Mississippi civil rights movemement. He used this book, and I've been recommending it to people ever since. His style and content are both amazing, and I feel really lucky to have had an opportunity to read this book in a course structured around it. _I've Got the Light of Freedom_ offers a new perspective on the way history is taught and remembered. Organizing and people's history are emphasized in what happens to be one of the best movement books out there. It's everything scholarly writing should be. Kudos to Charles Payne.

Who makes history? This book will tell you........1998-10-17

The real history of the civil rights movement. Who really made the difference in a day to day way on the front lines. Not only that, a description of how to organize from a working class, feminist perspective in the context of the African-American freedom struggle. A must read for anyone who is trying to build the movement we need today to make a world free of oppression.

Greater Boston: Adapting Regional Traditions to the Present (Metropolitan Portraits)

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Greater Boston: Adapting Regional Traditions to the Present (Metropolitan Portraits)
Sam Bass, Jr. Warner
Manufacturer: University of Pennsylvania Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Greater Portland: Urban Life and Landscape in the Pacific Northwest (Metropolitan Portraits)
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ASIN: 0812217691

The Human Tradition in California (Human Tradition in America)

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The Human Tradition in California (Human Tradition in America)
Igler David
Manufacturer: SR Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Americas | History | Subjects | Books

Social History | Historical Study | History | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0842050272

Book Description

With a land mass one and half times larger than the United Kingdom, a population of more than thirty million, and an economy that would rank sixth among world nations, the history of the state of California demands a closer look. The Human Tradition

The Human Tradition in the American West (Human Tradition in America)

Average customer rating:

A notable reference for anyone studying American history

The Human Tradition in the American West (Human Tradition in America)

Manufacturer: SR Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

West | Regional U.S. | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0842028617

Book Description

The Human Tradition in the American West is an engrossing collection of 13 biographies of men and women whose contributions to the development of the American West have largely been left untold in the history books. This volume goes beyond the traditional biographical reader by including the lives that collectively offer racial and gender diversity as well as differing class and sexual orientation backgrounds. Editors Benson Tong and Regan A. Lutz have assembled an impressive group of scholars whose succinct and well-written accounts will give students a more complete understanding of this diverse, dynamic region of the United States.

Customer Reviews:

A notable reference for anyone studying American history.......2001-11-09

A new arrival and notable reference for anyone studying American history and culture, Benson Tong and Regan Lutz's Human Tradition In The American West helps explain the changing cultural and social relationships of the early American West, using individual biographies to consider a region which often challenges easy answers. Chapters uses these biographies to examine a range of lives and experiences of the times.

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