This Light of Ours: Activist Photographers of the Civil Rights Movement

This Light of Ours: Activist Photographers of the Civil Rights Movement is a paradigm-shifting publication that presents the Civil Rights Movement through the work of nine activist photographers-men and women who chose to document the national struggle against segregation and other forms of race-based disenfranchisement from within the movement. Unlike images produced by photojournalists, who covered breaking news events, these photographers lived within the movement-primarily within the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) framework-and documented its activities by focusing on the student activists and local people who together made it happen.

The core of the book is a selection of 150 black-and-white photographs, representing the work of photographers Bob Adelman, George Ballis, Bob Fitch, Bob Fletcher, Matt Herron, David Prince, Herbert Randall, Maria Varela, and Tamio Wakayama. Images are grouped around four movement themes and convey SNCC's organizing strategies, resolve in the face of violence, impact on local and national politics, and influence on the nation's consciousness. The photographs and texts of This Light of Ours remind us that the movement was a battleground, that the battle was successfully fought by thousands of "ordinary" Americans among whom were the nation's courageous youth, and that the movement's moral vision and impact continue to shape our lives.

"This book of photographs, interviews, and biographies pays homage to nine activist photographers associated with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee who advanced the US civil rights cause by documenting movement actions and backlashes. The photographs poignantly and brilliantly capture key events in the southern movement in the 1960s--protests, memorials for murdered activists and innocent children, exuberant songfests, marches, and bloody encounters.... A must read. Summing Up: Essential." --CHOICE

This Light of Ours: Activist Photographers of the Civil Rights Movement is a paradigm-shifting publication that presents the Civil Rights Movement through the work of nine photographers who participated in the movement as activists with SNCC, SCLC, and CORE. Unlike images produced by photojournalists, who covered breaking news events, these photographers lived within the movement--primarily within the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) framework--and documented its activities by focusing on the student activists and local people who together made it happen.

The core of the book is a selection of 150 black-and-white photographs, representing the work of photographers Bob Adelman, George Ballis, Bob Fitch, Bob Fletcher, Matt Herron, David Prince, Herbert Randall, Maria Varela, and Tamio Wakayama. Images are grouped around four movement themes and convey SNCC's organizing strategies, resolve in the face of violence, impact on local and national politics, and influence on the nation's consciousness. The photographs and texts of This Light of Ours remind us that the movement was a battleground, that the battle was successfully fought by thousands of "ordinary" Americans among whom were the nation's courageous youth, and that the movement's moral vision and impact continue to shape our lives.

An astonishing visual record taken by photographers directly engaged in the struggle

Leslie G. Kelen, Salt Lake City, Utah, is executive director of the Center for Documentary Arts. He is the author of several books, including Faces and Voices of Refugee Youth; Streaked with Light and Shadow: Portraits of Former Soviet Jews in Utah; and Missing Stories: An Oral History of Ethnic and Minority Groups in Utah. Julian Bond, Washington, D.C., was chairman of the NAACP from 1998 to 2010 and was SNCC's communications director. Clayborne Carson, Palo Alto, California, is professor of history and founding director of the Martin Luther King, Jr., Research and Education Institute at Stanford University. He is also the author of In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s. Matt Herron, San Rafael, California, is an activist photographer and owner and director of Take Stock, an organization licensing the use of movement images for scholars and the media. Charles E. Cobb, Jr., is a SNCC veteran and author of On the Road to Freedom: A Guided Tour of the Civil Rights Trail.