Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Derrick Alridges The Educational Thought of W.E.B. Du Bois is a major contribution to American and African American intellectual and educational history. Alridge provides the first detailed scholarly analysis of the full range of Du Boiss educational philosophy, placing it within the context of the larger social and intellectual movements in American society and throughout the African world. Well documented and gracefully written, Alridges important work fills one of the remaining gaps in our knowledge and understanding of the intellectual legacy of the leading African American scholar-activist of the twentieth century.
Synopsis
This is the first published, comprehensive interpretation of Du Bois's educational thought. Historian Derrick P. Alridge moves beyond the overly discussed "debates" between Booker T. Washington and Du Bois to provide fresh insights into Du Bois's educational thinking. He draws on a plethora of published and unpublished primary sources to illuminate Du Bois's educational thought on a wide variety of issues, such as women and education, black leadership, black identity, civil rights, black higher education, community education, and academic achievement.
This incisive examination of Du Bois:
- Covers 70 years of Du Bois's life, from his graduation as the first black Ph.D. recipient at Harvard to his death in Ghana.
- Traces Du Bois's relationships with Booker T. Washington and other African American thinkers of his time.
- Shows how events such as lynchings, Reconstruction policies, and Progressivism influenced Du Bois's life and thinking.