Senator Obama's acceptance speech tonight comes with much anticipation. He will speak 45 years after MLK's "I have a dream" speech, and you can bet you'll hear that fact a couple gazillion times before the night is over. His acceptance will most certainly address King's powerful and influential speech. I read an excellent article written in the Nation by Melissa Harris-Lacewell that reminds us not to trivialize the role of African-American female organizers of King's time. She writes:
When Barack Obama takes the stage in Denver, he could draw on the political rhetoric of African-American women as the core of his historic speech. The Obama candidacy is built on the organizational foundation laid by these women at least as much as it is on the oratorical showmanship of black male preachers. Obama's speeches may be reminiscent of Dr. King, but his organizing fellows program, use of existing social networks and concern with sustained mobilization recall Ella Baker, the inspirational activist whose work set the course for every major civil rights organization of her time. It was Baker who kept refocusing the movement on organizing rather than oratory, and her work showed that when citizens are given the skills to organize on their own behalf, rather than relying on charismatic leaders to show them the way, real change happens.
Collectively we know very little about the deeds, lives and words of Baker and other black women leaders. Many Americans assume that they spoke about parochial, narrow or self-centered topics. Quite the opposite is true; black women's political work hits the notes of inclusion, universalism and patriotism that Obama needs to emphasize.
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