Randal Maurice Jelks je docentom amerických štúdií a afrických a afroamerických štúdií na University of Kansas. Je spolueditorom časopisu *American Studies*. Jeho výskum sa zameriava na literárne a historické témy.
Randal Maurice Jelks presents the first comprehensive biography of Benjamin Mays, a pivotal figure in the civil rights movement and mentor to Martin Luther King Jr. Highlighting Mays's roles as Dean at Howard University and president of Morehouse College, the narrative explores his influence on black leadership and education. Jelks emphasizes Mays's unique ability to intertwine Christian teachings with social justice, which empowered the black church to actively confront injustice during a crucial period in American history.
"You'll find hope in these pages. " --Jonathan Eig, author of Ali: A Life Letters to Martin contains twelve meditations on contemporary history and political struggles for our oxygen-deprived society. Evoking Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail," these meditations, written in the form of letters to King, speak specifically to the many public issues we presently confront in the United States--economic inequality, freedom of assembly, police brutality, ongoing social class conflicts, and geopolitics. Award-winning author Randal Maurice Jelks invites readers to reflect on US history by centering on questions of democracy that we must grapple with as a society. Hearkening to the era when James Baldwin, Dorothy Day, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Richard Wright used their writing to address the internal and external conflicts that the United States faced, this book is a contemporary revival of a literary tradition of meditative social analysis. These meditations on democracy provide spiritual oxygen to help readers endure the struggles of rebranding, rebuilding, and reforming our democratic institutions so that we can all breathe.
In 1964, Muhammad Ali said of his decision to join the Nation of Islam: “I know where I'm going and I know the truth and I don't have to be what you want me to be. I'm free to be what I want to be.” This sentiment, the brash assertion of individual freedom, informs and empowers each of the four personalities profiled in this book. Randal Maurice Jelks shows that to understand the black American experience beyond the larger narratives of enslavement, emancipation, and Black Lives Matter, we need to hear the individual stories. Drawing on his own experiences growing up as a religious African American, he shows that the inner history of black Americans in the 20th century is a story worthy of telling. This book explores the faith stories of four African Americans: Ethel Waters, Mary Lou Williams, Eldridge Cleaver, and Muhammad Ali. It examines their autobiographical writings, interviews, speeches, letters, and memorable performances to understand how each of these figures used religious faith publicly to reconcile deep personal struggles, voice their concerns for human dignity, and reinvent their public image. For them, liberation was not simply defined by material or legal wellbeing, but by a spiritual search for community and personal wholeness.
