African American Quotes - Page 27

• The lives of most men are patchwork quilts. Or at best one matching outfit with a closet and laundry bag full of incongruous accumulations. A lifetime of training for just ten seconds.

  Jesse Owens

  Quilts, Men, Words Of Wisdom

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• The point is, you have an ethnic heritage and you have a human heritage. Your human heritage includes everything of human value.

  Stanley Crouch

  Words Of Wisdom, Heritage, Humans

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• Selfishness is the most constant of human motives. Patriotism, humanity, or the love of God may lead to sporadic outbursts sweep away the heaped-up wrongs of centuries; but they languish at times, while the love of self works on ceaselessly, unwearyingly,burrowing always at the very root of life, and heaping up fresh wrongs for other centuries to sweep away.

  Charles W. Chesnutt

  Roots, Self, Humanity

  Charles W. Chesnutt (2008). “The Portable Charles W. Chesnutt”, p.382, Penguin

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• The history of a movement, the history of a nation, the history of a race is the guide-post of that movement's destiny, that nation's destiny, that race's destiny.

  Marcus Garvey

  Destiny, Race, History

  Marcus Garvey (2015). “Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey”, p.6, Ravenio Books

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• At the heart of all that civilization has meant and developed is 'community' - the mutually cooperative and voluntary venture of man to assume a semblance of responsibility for his brother.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Brother, Responsibility, Heart

  Martin Luther King (Jr.), Alex Ayres (1993). “The Wisdom of Martin Luther King, Jr”, Plume

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• I'm not against knowing the history of white people in the U.S. - that's not the point. The point is that there's so much greater history. We don't know about Native Americans. Very basically, we don't know that much about African American history, except that they were enslaved. You only get bits and pieces.

  Luis J. Rodriguez

  Native American, White, Knowing

  Source: bluemesareview.org

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• Schooling is what happens inside the wall of the school, some of which is educational. Education happens everywhere, and it happens from the moment a child is born-some say before-until it dies.

  Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot

  Education, Children, Wall

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• Oh, I love labels, as long as they are numerous. I'm an American writer. I'm a Nigerian writer. I'm a Nigerian American writer. I'm an African writer. I'm a Yoruba writer. I'm an African American writer. I'm a writer who's been strongly influenced by European precedents. I'm a writer who feels very close to literary practice in India - which I go to quite often - and to writers over there.

  Teju Cole

  Practice, Long, India

  "Teju Cole on the 'Empathy Gap' and Tweeting Drone Strikes". Interview with Sarah Zhang, www.motherjones.com. March 6, 2013.

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• I don't think there has been any mayor in America scrutinized that way. I don't think there has been any mayor as a matter of fact, Coleman Young I think received an incredible amount of scrutiny and he was kind of the poster child for that in Detroit. He was the first Black mayor who really expressed his manhood in a different way than had been seen from African-American man that was projected across the country.

  Kwame Kilpatrick

  Country, Children, Men

  Source: www.finalcall.com

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• Michigan is very racially separated and the city of Detroit itself is 84 percent African-American and the surrounding suburbs are 86 percent White.

  Kwame Kilpatrick

  Cities, White, Michigan

  Source: www.finalcall.com

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• Remember that everyone's life is measured by the power that individual has to make the world better-this is all life is.

  Booker T. Washington

  World, Remember, Life Is

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• I did want to mark the fact that it was the first African-American to win the Lead Actress category.I thought it was so progressive.

  Viola Davis

  Winning, Want, Firsts

  Source: www.usmagazine.com

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• Teachers and librarians can be the most effective advocates for diversifying children's and young adult books. When I speak to publishers, they're going to expect me to say that I would love to see more books by Native American authors and African-American authors and Arab-American authors. But when a teacher or librarian says this to publishers, it can have a profound effect.

  Pat Mora

  Teacher, Children, Book

  Source: www.teachingbooks.net

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• The notion that black folks have nothing to learn from scholarship that may reflect racial or racist biases is dangerous. It promotes closed-mindedness and a narrow understanding of knowledge to hold that "race" is such an overwhelming concept that it negates the validity of any insights contained in a work that may have some racist or sexist aspects.

  Bell Hooks

  Race, Racism, Understanding

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• I was born black and female.

  Lorraine Hansberry

  Black, Female, Born

  Lorraine Hansberry (2012). “Les Blancs: The Collected Last Plays: The Drinking Gourd/What Use Are Flowers?”, p.8, Vintage

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• African Americans were responsible for creating a lot of this beautiful and elaborate ironwork; we weren't just working in the cotton fields.

  Philip Freelon

  Beautiful, Creating, Cotton

  Source: www.nbcnews.com

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• There's a place in me that can really relate to being the underdog. I'm always fighting to overcome the obstacle. I can really understand what's that about.

  Halle Berry

  Fighting, Challenges, Underdog

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• Mostly I'm proud to be an African-American woman, but I'm glad I have a universal look as well.

  Chanel Iman

  Looks, Proud, Wells

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• No one would stand for it [being the fool in the media] in a minute if you took any other group -Native Americans, African Americans, Hispanics, women - but somehow it's okay to do that with hillbillies.

  John Shelton Reed

  Native American, Media, Groups

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• I am an African-American in America. That will never change. But I don't have to be defined by thatWe always try to find similarities in life, no matter what it is so they're going to try to put you in a box with other African-American quarterbacks - Vick, Newton, Randall Cunningham, Warren MoonThat's the goal. Just to go out and not try to prove anybody wrong but just let your talents speak for themselves.

  Robert Griffin III

  America, Goal, Trying

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• Making African American films are hard in Hollywood. We need to rely on a support network and bring more cohesion to different filmmakers, actors, producers etc. It's a very difficult business. There aren't a lot of Africans Americans or people of color in high positions in Hollywood that we can green-light films.

  Paula Patton

  Light, Color, People

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• There's no doubt that many of the mainstream white institutions tend to be cosmetic and symbolic when it comes to including African-Americans, whereas we black folk tend to be much more sensitive about embracing others, and we have a long history of that.

  Cornel West

  White, Long, Black

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• There are individuals who are working very hard to promote fear and antagonism towards Islam and Muslims in this country. It's fueled, in part, by the first African-American president that we have. Obama's father was a Muslim and people have used this to arouse hostility against him.

  Feisal Abdul Rauf

  Country, Father, Working Very Hard

  "Q&A with Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf". Religion News Service Interview, www.washingtonpost.com. August 29, 2012.

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• I maintain that I have been a Negro three times--a Negro baby, a Negro girl and a Negro woman. Still, if you have received no clear cut impression of what the Negro in America is like, then you are in the same place with me. There is no The Negro here. Our lives are so diversified, internal attitudes so varied, appearances and capabilities so different, that there is no possible classification so catholic that it will cover us all, except My people! My people!

  Zora Neale Hurston

  Girl, Baby, Attitude

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• The suggestion of denying any measure of their full political rights to such a great group of our population as the colored people is one which, however it might be received in some other quarters, could not possibly be permitted by one who feels a responsibility for living up to the traditions and maintaining the principles of the Republican Party. Our Constitution guarantees equal rights to all our citizens, without discrimination on account of race or color. I have taken my oath to support that Constitution.

  Calvin Coolidge

  Taken, Party, Responsibility

  Letter to Charles F. Gardner, August 9, 1924.

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