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The American Civil War lasted from 1861 to 1865. It is also called the War Between the States. The main reason for the war was the issue of slavery. In slavery, white people owned black people and forced them to work for no pay.
In 1861, there were just 34 states, and Abraham Lincoln was the president. Fifteen of the states, located in the South, permitted slavery and were known as slave states. The rest of the states, where slavery was illegal, were called free states
The South based its economy on cotton plantations and slaves. The North wanted black people to be free.

Lincoln was an abolitionist, which means he was against slavery. He wanted the United States government to make slavery illegal in the existing states and in the new states that would come. When he was elected, seven slave states succeeded from the United States. They formed a new country called the Confederate States of America, or the Confederacy. Jefferson Davis was the Confederate president. In all, a total of 11 slave states seceded to make up the Confederacy. The northern states that did not secede made up the Union.

The Civil War began in April 1861. Over 600.000 on both sides died. The south was destined. In April 1865 the south surrendered to the north. The war was over, the north won and slavery was abolished.

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Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, making slavery illegal throughout the United States.
This was the first step toward abolition of slavery in the United States.

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Amendements 13th, 14th and 15th

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Lincoln was assassinated on April 15 1865, under the administration of President Andrew Johnson new southern state legislatures passed restrictive “Black Codes. They are laws  that restricted the freedom of black people (freedmen) and the right to own property, conduct business, buy and lease land, and move freely through public spaces such as Southern towns.

Restrictions included also prohibiting them from voting, bearing arms and learning to read and write.

Black people couldn’t marry white people and they were excluded from political life.

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An American white supremacist hate group that employed terror to impose white supremacy. The Klan existed in 3 different eras:
1) right after the Civil War, it used violence to restore the white supremacy;
2) In the 20s, it opposed not only African Americans, but also Jews and Catholics;
3) In the 50s, as opposition to the civil right movement, often using violence and murder to suppress activists

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From the late 1870s, Southern state legislatures
passed laws requiring the separation of white from “people of colour” in public transportation and schools.
The segregation principle was extended to parks, cemeteries, theatres, and restaurants in an effort to prevent any contact between Black and white as equals.  Interracial marriages were illegal.
1896 Separate but equal
On buses and trains, they had to sit in a
different section from white passengers. African Americans had to go to different hospitals and shops and they couldn’t eat in the same restaurants with white Americans. The segregation laws  at the time said African Americans were ‘separate but equal’ – so they had to live separate lives from white
Americans.
White and black couldn’t go to the same school.

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The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans and its aim is to ensure equal rights and education to African Americans.

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Rosa Parks was born in Alabama in 1913. She lived at a time when there was a
lot of racial discrimination against black people in the USA. For example, the
school she attended in Alabama was for African-American students only. White
children were educated in separate schools. In 1932 Rosa married Raymond
Parks, an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of
Coloured People (NAACP). In 1943 she joined the NAACP and became actively
involved in the Civil Rights Movement.
In 1955 Rosa worked as a seamstress at a department store. On December 1st
she got on the bus to go home as usual and sat in a seat reserved for black
passengers. As the bus was full and some white passengers were standing, the
driver asked some black passengers to give up their seats to the white
passengers. Rosa refused and the driver called the police. When the police
arrived they arrested her.

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Ci sono icone della storia universale di cui conosciamo ben poco, al massimo gli eventi più eclatanti che ne hanno deciso la fama. Un esempio? Prendete Rosa Parks, la donna afroamericana divenuta famosa per aver rifiutato di cedere il posto su un autobus a un bianco negli Stati Uniti. Era il primo dicembre del 1955, e da quel momento in poi il suo gesto rivoluzionario sarebbe stato consegnato alla storia, segnando una delle tappe fondamentali nella battaglia per i diritti civili dei neri.
Ma cosa si nasconde dietro quel celebre " I don't think I should have to stand up " rivolto dalla Parks all'autista del pulmino che le intimava di alzarsi dal sedile? Da dove parte la vita e il pensiero di questa attivista, la cui militanza politica non si limitò solo all'esemplare "rifiuto" di Montgomery?

UNA VITA DEDICATA ALLA LOTTA PER L'UGUAGLIANZA

A ripercorrere le imprese politiche e sociali di questa paladina dei diritti civili è oggi un nuovo cortometraggio animato dal titolo The Hidden Life of Rosa Parks. Diretto dallo studio californiano Eido, e realizzato in occasione della lezione TED-Ed tenuta dal docente Riché Richardson, il film ripercorre in quasi cinque minuti ciò che avvenne prima e dopo il gesto dell'autobus, un gesto di certo eclatante, ma non l'unico degno di memoria nella vita della protagonista.
Dai primi passi nel movimento anti-segregazione americano negli anni Quaranta al ruolo come segretaria nella National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP); dalle prime proteste al fianco dei lavoratori di colore sottopagati al susseguente tributo da parte di leader come Martin Luther King e Barack Obama. Una staffetta di eventi biografici e professionali che ebbero come denominatore comune il diritto all'uguaglianza tra gli esseri umani.
- Alex Urso

Artista e curatore. Diplomato in Pittura (Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera). Laureato in Lettere Moderne (Università di Macerata, Università di Bologna). Corsi di perfezionamento in Arts and Heritage Management (Università Bocconi) e Arts and Culture Strategy (Università della Pennsylvania). Tra le istituzioni con cui ha collaborato in questi anni: Zacheta - National Gallery of Art di Varsavia, Istituto Italiano di Cultura di Varsavia, Padiglione Polacco - 16. Mostra Internazionale di Architettura Biennale di Venezia, Fondazione Benetton (catalogo "Imagus Mundi"), Adam Mickiewicz Institute. Nel 2017 è stato curatore della "Biennale de La Biche". Dal 2014 scrive di arte per Artribune. Sempre per Artribune cura "Fantagraphic", la rubrica di fumetti del sito. Suoi articoli e testi critici sono apparsi su cataloghi e testate di settore nazionali e internazionali.

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Combattere per l'uguaglianza. La vita di Rosa Parks in un corto animato

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Ci sono icone della storia universale di cui conosciamo ben poco, al massimo gli eventi più eclatanti che ne hanno deciso la fama. Un esempio? Prendete Rosa Parks, la donna afroamericana divenuta famosa per aver rifiutato di cedere il posto su un autobus a un bianco negli Stati Uniti.

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After her arrest a boycott of Montgomery’s city buses was organised: instead of
using the city’s buses, African-American people in Montgomery walked, cycled or
went by car. The Montgomery Bus Boycott lasted 381 days and was one of the
most successful protests against racial segregation in history. It ended in 1956
after the United States Supreme Court declared that racial segregation laws on
public transport were unconstitutional. After this important victory, Rosa became
a symbol of the Civil Rights Movement in the USA and she is still remembered as
‘the first lady of civil rights’.

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One of the leaders of the Montgomery Bus Boycott was African American church
minister, Martin Luther King Jr. He became the leader of the Civil Rights
Movement that wanted African Americans to have the same right to freedom
and equality as white Americans. Martin Luther King believed in non-violent
protest and he organised many campaigns against racial discrimination. The
police frequently arrested him and sent him to prison, but he continued to
protest. At the end of the demonstration, segregation on buses was declared
unconstitutional and from that moment on, black and white people were able to
sit in buses as equals. Two years later he and other civil rights activists founded
an organisation of black churches whose aim was to control and organised non-
violent protests for the civil rights reform. MLK became its leader and organised
marches for some of the basic civil rights for black people which made him
become a human rights icon.

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In 1963, there was an important civil rights protest in Washington. Martin Luther
King spoke to the people about his dream for the future: freedom and equality
for all Americans. He began with the words: ‘I have a dream’. His speech is
famous all over the world. In 1964,  he  won  the  Nobel  Prize  for  Peace  and
in  1965,  the  American  government finally made it possible for all African
Americans to vote.Martin Luther King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee,
in April 1968, but in July 1968, the American Government passed the Civil Rights
Act and finally African Americans had the same rights as white Americans

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ENGLISH SPEECH | MARTIN LUTHER KING: I Have a Dream (English Subtitles)

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Thanks to people like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, who fought for the
rights of all black people, things started to change in 1960s. Ruby Bridges,  born
in 1954, was the first African-American to attend an all-whites school in New
Orleans in 1960.

Ruby was born the same year that the Supreme Court decided to desegregate
schools. In kindergarten, they chose Ruby as one of the many African-American
school kids to take the test that would determine if they could attend a white
school or not. The test was difficult so that the kids taking it would have a
difficult time passing. In fact, if the black kids failed, schools in New Orleans had
a chance of staying segregated for longer.

Ruby was one of the six black children in New Orleans who passed the test but
was the only one who had to attend William Frantz Elementary which was an all-
white school. Her first day of school, her mother and four federal marshals took
her for her safety while people shouted at her. Norman Rockwell
commemorated the event in a painting titled ‘The Problem We All Lived In’

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On the first day Ruby went to William Frantz, parents of the students in the
school pulled their children out and only one teacher agreed to teach her: she
was alone in her classroom. Ruby's parents also went through difficult times
when their daughter was attending the all-white-school: her faher lost his job
and some shops banned them. But there were people – both black and white –
who helped Ruby and her family: some white families continued to send their
children to William Frantz when the little black girl was schooling there
Ruby went on to finish her elementary and high school years in desegregated
schools in New Orleans. She got married to Malcolm Hall, had four sons and
lived in New Orleans working as a travel agent for 15 years before becoming a
full-time parent. Ruby founded the Ruby Bridges Foundation in 1999. The
foundation aims to “promote the values of tolerance, respect, and appreciation
of all differences”. President Bill Clinton awarded Ruby with a Presidential
Citizens Medal on January 8, 2001.

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TOUCH this image to discover its story. Image tagging powered by ThingLink

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With President Johnson, the Civil Rights Act becomes a law.
It outlaws segregation, Jim Crow laws and any discrimination based on race, nationality, origin and gendre.
In the same year, Martin Luther King wins the Nobel Peace Prize.

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1) The Voting Rights Act becomes law and makes it illegal to prevent any citizen from voting, regardless their race, it puts a ban on voter literary tests and makes poll taxes illegal.
2) Bloody Sunday: on March 7th, 600 civil marchers in Selma, Alabama, are met with gas and police and many are injured.

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This was the last legislation enhanced duting the Civil Rights Era.
"It is illegal to discriminate in the sale or rental of housing, ... The Fair Housing Act prohibits this discrimination because of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status, and disability."

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Politician Colin Powell is the first African American Secretary of State

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Obama is the first African American President of the United States.

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Kamala Harris is the first African American and the first woman to become Vice President of the United States.
See dedicated lesson

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black

lives

matter

01

Black Lives Matter (BLM), is an international social movement, formed in the United States in 2013, dedicated to fighting racism and anti-Black violence, especially in the form of police brutality.

The names most associated with Black Lives Matterare not its leadersbut the victimswho have drawn attentionto the massive issuesof racism this country grapples with:George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Eric Garner, Michael Brown, to name a few.

The name Black Lives Matter signals condemnation of the unjust killings of Black people by police (Black people are far more likely to be killed by police in the United States than white people) and the demand that society value the lives and humanity of Black people as much as it values the lives and humanity of white people.

BLM activists have held large and influential protests in cities across the United States as well as internationally. Black Lives Matter is also decentralized by activists in local chapters who organize their own campaigns and programs. The chapters are affiliated with the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, a nonprofit civil rights organization that is active in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.

BLM was cofounded as an online movement (using the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter on social media) by three Black community organizers-Patrisse Khan-Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tometi. They formed BLM after George Zimmerman, a man of German and Peruvian descent, was acquitted on charges stemming from his fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed Black teenager, in Sanford, Florida,in February 2012.

Zimmerman, a neighbourhood-watch volunteer, had seen Martin walking in his neighbourhood and called the police because he thought Martin looked "suspicious."Although police told Zimmerman not to do anything,he followed Martin, got into an argument with him,and shot and killed him.

Zimmerman remained free for weeks after the shooting but was finally charged with second-degree murder and arrested in April, after demonstrations demanding his prosecution were held in cities across the United States. At his trial more than a year later, Zimmerman claimed that he had acted in self- defense. His acquittal in July 2013 was widely perceived as amiscarriage of justice and led to further nationwide protests.

The BLM movement expanded in 2014 after the police killings of two unarmed Black men,Eric Garner and Michael Brown. Garner died in Staten Island, New York, after a white police officer held him in a prolonged illegal choke hold, which was captured in a video taken by a bystander.Brown, a teenager, was shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri.

Large protests of these deaths in the name of Black Lives Matter captured national and international attention. The BLM movement thereafter continued to play a prominent role in demonstrations against police brutality and racism. Notably, BLM activists protested the deaths at the hands of police or while in police custody of several other Black people.

In 2016 major American sports stars lend their voices to the cause of Black Lives Matter. In July, basketball players including LeBron James and Carmelo Anthony opened an awards ceremony by speaking about recent deaths of Black people, saying: "Enough is enough."

Then, from August, many sports stars began taking part in protests during national anthems at sports games, beginning with Colin Kaepernick, who knelt during the anthem ahead of an NFL game.

In 2020 George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, was pronounced dead after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on Floyd's neck for several minutes, despite Floyd's repeated protests that he could not breathe. Wide circulation of a bystander's video of Floyd's last minutes triggered massive demonstrations in cities throughout the United States and across the globe.

The tragedy swayed U.S. public opinion in favour of the Black Lives Matter movement while drawing wide attention to the problem ofrooted racism in American society.

NFL Players & Black Lives Matter

The Black Lives Matter movement has many goals. BLM activists seek to draw attention to the many ways in which Black people are treated unfairly in society and the ways in which institutions, laws, and policies help to perpetuate that unfairness. The movement has fought racism through such means as political action, letter writing campaigns, and nonviolent protests.

BLM seeks to combat police brutality, the over-policing of minority neighbourhoods,and the abuses committedin jails. Its efforts have included calls for better training for police and greater accountability for police misconduct. BLM activists have also called for "defunding" the police-that is, reducing police department budgets and investing the freed-up funds in community social services.

thanks

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Black Lives Matter by Clara Mingrino on Genially

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black lives matter 01 Black Lives Matter (BLM), is an international social movement, formed in the United States in 2013, dedicated to fighting racism and anti-Black violence, especially in the form of police brutality.