Malcolm X We Didn't Land Term Paper

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However, many other strands of thought have converged to create a collective black identity and historiography. For example, the syncretic slave religions that merged African practices with Christianity allowed slave families and communities to hold on to their ancestry and traditions in the face of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual oppression. Similarly, the creation of the African Episcopal Church (AME) in the early nineteenth century marked a distinctive and unique sociological event in African-American history. African-American religious identity has been diverse but has always been defined by the ability to merge various historical and social realities within a collective spiritual framework.

The Nation of Islam and the embrace of Sunni Islam by African-Americans also reflect this tendency in African-American history. Malcolm X and others found in Islam a means by which to re-connect with their African roots and heritages. While Islam was not the religion of their ancestors in Africa, it was the religion of modern Africa. Malcolm X was a sincere adherent to the faith, evident by his willingness to not only pilgrimage to Mecca but also to experience life in Africa first-hand.

Therefore, the statement made by Malcolm X is highly relevant for historians who are attempting to recreate American history in general and African-American history in specific. Rephrasing the settlement of New England and the American colonies in terms of oppression rather than conquest and triumph is significant.

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Were it not for radicals like Malcolm X it is possible that such alternative viewpoints would never have been voiced in the public consciousness. Had Malcolm X not been assassinated, martyred for his beliefs, Spike Lee might have never been able to make a film of such epic proportions, a film that has the potential to re-educate people about the history of African-American people.

What students of American history often miss is the black experience and the black perspective. Not just Islam but also black liberation theology and the Africanization of Scripture show that African-American history and religion are closely linked. Because slaves were prohibited from practicing their indigenous religious traditions and because the slaves were descended from various ethnic and religious tribes in Africa, slave religion in general was too diverse to be lumped together under one common umbrella religion. African-Americans who subsequently embraced Christian theology likewise had to discover their own ways of worship, as the history of the AME illustrates. Finally, the Nation of Islam and Sunni Islam brought to African-American consciousness a new identity, one that transcended both the need to reclaim the lost traditions of their ancestry and that withstood pressures to conform to the religion of the perceived oppressor: Christianity. Malcolm X's life and Spike Lee's film based on it aptly illustrate these trends in African-American religious and cultural history.

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