Martin Luther King Jr. Day is a national holiday held on the third Monday of January each year. Signed into law in January 1983 by President Ronald Reagan, the national Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday is a celebration of Dr. King’s immeasurable contribution to the United States, and to humanity.
Martin Luther King Jr. Interviewed in 1967
Martin Luther King Jr
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King: a Life
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Named one of the ten best books of 2023 by The Washington Post | Chicago Tribune | Time A New York Times bestseller and notable book of 2023 | One of Barack Obama's favorite books of 2023 One of The New Yorker's essential reads of 2023 | A Christian Science Monitor best book of the year | One of Air Mail's twelve best books of 2023 A Washington Post and National Indie Bestseller | One of Publishers Weekly's best nonfiction books of 2023 | One of Smithsonian magazine's ten best books of 2023 "Supple, penetrating, heartstring-pulling and compulsively readable . . . Eig's book is worthy of its subject." --Dwight Garner, The New York Times (Editors' Choice) "[King is] infused with the narrative energy of a thriller . . . The most compelling account of King's life in a generation." --Mark Whitaker, The Washington Post "No book could be more timely than Jonathan Eig's sweeping and majestic new King . . . Eig has created 2023′s most vital tome." --Will Bunch, The Philadelphia Inquirer Hailed by The New York Times as "the new definitive biography," King mixes revelatory new research with accessible storytelling to offer an MLK for our times. Vividly written and exhaustively researched, Jonathan Eig's King: A Life is the first major biography in decades of the civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr.--and the first to include recently declassified FBI files. In this revelatory new portrait of the preacher and activist who shook the world, the bestselling biographer gives us an intimate view of the courageous and often emotionally troubled human being who demanded peaceful protest for his movement but was rarely at peace with himself. He casts fresh light on the King family's origins as well as MLK's complex relationships with his wife, father, and fellow activists. King reveals a minister wrestling with his own human frailties and dark moods, a citizen hunted by his own government, and a man determined to fight for justice even if it proved to be a fight to the death. As he follows MLK from the classroom to the pulpit to the streets of Birmingham, Selma, and Memphis, Eig dramatically re-creates the journey of a man who recast American race relations and became our only modern-day founding father--as well as the nation's most mourned martyr. In this landmark biography, Eig gives us an MLK for our times: a deep thinker, a brilliant strategist, and a committed radical who led one of history's greatest movements, and whose demands for racial and economic justice remain as urgent today as they were in his lifetime. Includes 8 pages of black-and-white photographs
I May Not Get There with You
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A private citizen who transformed the world around him, Martin Luther King, Jr., was arguably the greatest American who ever lived. Now, after more than thirty years, few people understand how truly radical he was. In this groundbreaking examination of the man and his legacy, provocative author, lecturer, and professor Michael Eric Dyson restores King's true vitality and complexity and challenges us to embrace the very contradictions that make King relevant in today's world.
We Shall Overcome
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A collection of papers by Black artists and scholars who attended a symposium on the work of Martin Luther King, Jr. In We Shall Overcome, America's leading scholars and activists from the civil rights years speak on a fascinating range of experiences surrounding King and his era, from his early personal religious conversion to his impact on the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa; from his place in the history of the African-American church to the rise in Third World liberation struggles.
To the Mountaintop
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Stewart Burns draws not only on King's speeches, letters, writings, and well-reported strategizing and activities, but also on previously underutilized oral histories of key meetings and events, which present a dramatic account of King and the movement in the crucial years from 1955 to 1968. In a striking departure from earlier books on Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement, Burns focuses on King's biblical faith and spiritual vision as fundamental to his political leadership and shows how these threads wove together a "single garment of destiny," making King the most important social prophet of the twentieth century.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
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Desert Rose
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Desert Rose details Coretta Scott King's upbringing in a family of proud, land-owning African Americans with a profound devotion to the ideals of social equality and the values of education, as well as her later role as her husband's most trusted confidant and advisor. Coretta Scott King--noted author, human rights activist, and wife and partner of famed Civil Rights Movement leader Martin Luther King Jr.--grew up in the rural Alabama Black Belt with her older sister, Edythe Scott Bagley. Bagley chronicles the sisters' early education together at the Crossroads School and later at the progressive Lincoln School in Marion. She describes Coretta's burgeoning talent for singing and her devotion to musical studies, and the sisters' experiences matriculating at Antioch College, an all-white college far from the rural South. Bagley provides vivid insights into Coretta's early passion for racial and economic justice, which lead to her involvement in the Peace Movement and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. As Coretta's older sister, Edythe shared in almost all of Coretta's many trials and tribulations. Desert Rose charts Coretta's hesitance about her romance with Martin Luther King and the prospect of having to sacrifice her dream of a career in music to become a minister's wife. Ultimately, Coretta chose to utilize her artistic gifts and singing voice for the Movement through the development and performance of Freedom Concerts. This book also charts Coretta's own commitment and dedication, in the years that followed King's death, to the causes of international civil rights, the antiapartheid movement, and the establishment of the King Center in Atlanta and the national King Holiday. Coretta's devotion to activism, motherhood, and the movement led by her husband, and her courageous assumption of the legacy left in the wake of King's untimely assassination, are wonderfully detailed in this intimate biography.
Dare to Dream
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A sensitive biography that uses Coretta Scott King's autobiography as its principal source.
Coretta Scott King
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Coretta Scott was committed to social justice long before she met and married Martin Luther King, Jr. She shared in all the dangers that King's prominence in the civil rights movement brought, and she saw herself as full partner in the movement. Yet she generally remained in the background, supporting King's work and caring for their children, until his assassination transformed her into a movement leader in her own right: founder of the King Center, leader of a mass demonstration for a renewed national commitment to nonviolent social change, force behind the establishment of the national holiday bearing her husband's name. This book follows the trajectory of Coretta Scott King's tumultuous life at the heart of the most important American social movement of the 20th century. Coretta Scott was committed to social justice long before she met and married Martin Luther King, Jr. She shared in all the dangers that King's prominence in the civil rights movement brought, and she saw herself as full partner in the movement. Yet she generally remained in the background, supporting King's work and caring for their children, until his assassination transformed her into a movement leader in her own right: founder of the King Center, leader of a mass demonstration for a renewed national commitment to nonviolent social change, force behind the establishment of the national holiday bearing her husband's name. This book follows the trajectory of Coretta Scott King's tumultuous life at the heart of the most important American social movement of the 20th century.
She Persisted: Coretta Scott King
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Inspired by the #1 New York Times bestseller She Persisted by Chelsea Clinton and Alexandra Boiger, a chapter book series about women who spoke up and rose up against the odds--including Coretta Scott King! In this chapter book biography by award-winning author Kelly Starling Lyons, readers learn about the amazing life of Coretta Scott King--and how she persisted. Coretta Scott King is known for being the wife of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., but she was a civil rights activist and leader in her own right! She was a singer and an author too, and her work made a difference for Black Americans and for all women for decades to come. Complete with an introduction from Chelsea Clinton, black-and-white illustrations throughout, and a list of ways that readers can follow in Coretta Scott King's footsteps and make a difference!A perfect choice for kids who love learning and teachers who want to bring inspiring women into their curriculum. And don't miss out on the rest of the books in the She Persisted series, featuring so many more women who persisted, including Oprah Winfrey, Harriet Tubman, Ruby Bridges, and more! Praise for She Persisted- Coretta Scott King- "This book profiles the uplifting voice of an activist worth recognizing in her own right and Lyons manages to weave in a healthy amount of emotion into this account . . . A brief but effective account of not-often-taught figure that would nicely complement curriculum units on the Civil Rights Movement." --School Library Journal
Coretta Scott King
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Traces the life and accomplishments of the civil rights leader and widow of Dr. Martin Luther King.
Coretta Scott King and the Center for Nonviolent Social Change
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Coretta Scott King, a woman of intelligence and refinement, served as the perfect partner for Martin Luther King Jr. A strong leader in her own right, she fought for the civil rights of all Americans, advocated for the establishment of a national holiday in memory of her husband, and founded the Center for Nonviolent Social Change to continue her husband's work.
Women Who Broke the Rules: Coretta Scott King
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Well-behaved women seldom make history. --Laurel Thatcher Ulrich Women Who Broke the Rules celebrates the bold and brave women who have forged their own paths--breaking rules along the way--to help shape our country's past, present, and future. Acclaimed author Kathleen Krull blends history and humor in this accessible young biography series. Coretta Scott King was an American civil rights activist and the wife of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. But she established a distinguished career in activism in her own right, taking part in the Montgomery Bus Boycott and working to pass the Civil Rights Act. After King's death, she founded the Center for Nonviolent Social Change in Atlanta, Georgia, and remained dedicated to fighting for civil rights.
My Life with Martin Luther King, Jr.
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A revised, shortened edition of King's memoir of her life with Martin Luther King, Jr., with black-and-white photos.
The Arc of Truth
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Martin Luther King Jr. said and wrote as much or more about the meaning, nature, and power of truth as any other prominent figure in the 1950s and '60s. King was not only vastly influential as an advocate for and defender of truth; he also did more than anyone in his time to organize truth into a movement for the liberation, uplift, and empowerment of humanity, efforts that ultimately resulted in the loss of his life. Drawing on King's published and unpublished sermons, speeches, and writings, The Arc of Truth explores King's lifelong pilgrimage in pursuit of truth. Lewis Baldwin explores King's quest for truth from his inquisitive childhood to the influence of family and church, to Morehouse College, Crozer Theological Seminary, Boston University, and other academic institutions in the Northeast. Continuing on, the book follows King's sense that he was involved in experiments of truth within the context of the struggle to liberate and empower humanity, to his understanding of the civil rights movement as unfolding truth, to his persistent challenge to America around its need to engage in a serious reckoning with truth regarding its history and heritage. Baldwin investigates King's determination to speak truth to power, and his untiring efforts to actualize what he envisioned as the truthful ends of the beloved community through the truthful means of nonviolent direct action. King believed, taught, and demonstrated by example that truth derives from a revolution in the heart, mind, and soul before it can be translated into institutions and structures that guarantee freedom, justice, human dignity, equality of opportunity, and peace. Ultimately, King's significance for humanity cannot be considered only his contributions as a preacher, pastor, civil rights leader, and world figure--he was and remains equally impactful as a theologian, philosopher, and ethicist whose life and thought evince an enduring search for and commitment to truth.
Church in Color
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Congregational leaders are often unsure how to attend to the complexities of racism and racial division in the United States. One common response is to acknowledge that racism is wrong and then avoid the topic as much as possible. This is especially the case in youth and young adult ministries, as pastors and other youth workers attempt to foster a sense of community and identity that transcends race. While this method may seem helpful on the surface, it ultimately undermines the goal of offering young people authentically Christian mentoring, understanding, and pastoral care. There is a dire need for a practical theological framework that welcomes young people's experiences and questions regarding race into the work of theology and vocational discernment. In this groundbreaking ethnographic and theological account, Montague R. Williams unearths and examines the realities of race in multiracial and multiethnic youth ministries in the United States. Church in Color invites readers to consider stories of young people in three distinct congregations and witness their longing for a Christian discipleship that grapples with rather than avoids race. Williams further analyzes how young people communicate this longing and why it is difficult for congregational leaders to recognize and respond to it. Finally, placing these findings in dialogue with an in-depth and nuanced engagement of Martin Luther King Jr.'s theological aesthetics, Williams guides congregations to embrace a discipleship that recognizes, remembers, and wrestles with the realities of race, racism, and racial identity. Church in Color demonstrates the importance of including the questions and experiences of young people from diverse backgrounds in the work of theological construction. It also models how to bring various fields, such as congregational studies, youth ministry, race theory, pop culture, and Kingian theology, together within a broader practical theological conversation. Most significantly, Church in Color charts a path forward for the future of intergenerational Christian communities in a racialized world.
The Critique of Nonviolence
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How does Martin Luther King, Jr., understand race philosophically and how did this understanding lead him to develop an ontological conception of racist police violence? In this important new work, Mark Christian Thompson attempts to answer these questions, examining ontology in Martin Luther King, Jr.'s philosophy. Specifically, the book reads King through 1920s German academic debates between Martin Heidegger, Rudolf Bultmann, Hans Jonas, Carl Schmitt, Eric Voegelin, Hannah Arendt, and others on Being, gnosticism, existentialism, political theology, and sovereignty. It further examines King's dissertation about Tillich, as well other key texts from his speculative writings, sermons, and speeches, positing King's understanding of divine love as a form of Heideggerian ontology articulated in beloved community. Tracking the presence of twentieth-century German philosophy and theology in his thought, the book situates King's ontology conceptually and socially in nonviolent protest. In so doing, The Critique of Nonviolence reads King's "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" (1963) with Walter Benjamin's "Critique of Violence" (1921) to reveal the depth of King's political-theological critique of police violence as the illegitimate appropriation of the racialized state of exception. As Thompson argues, it is in part through its appropriation of German philosophy and theology that King's ontology condemns the perpetual American state of racial exception that permits unlimited police violence against Black lives.
King's Vibrato
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In King's Vibrato Maurice O. Wallace explores the sonic character of Martin Luther King Jr.'s voice and its power to move the world. Providing a cultural history and critical theory of the black modernist soundscapes that helped inform King's vocal timbre, Wallace shows how the qualities of King's voice depended on a mix of ecclesial architecture and acoustics, musical instrumentation and sound technology, audience and song. He examines the acoustical architectures of the African American churches where King spoke and the centrality of the pipe organ in these churches, offers a black feminist critique of the influence of gospel on King, and outlines how variations in natural environments and sound amplifications made each of King's three deliveries of the "I Have a Dream" speech unique. By mapping the vocal timbre of one of the most important figures of black hope and protest in American history, Wallace presents King as the embodiment of the sound of modern black thought.
A Knock at Midnight
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With fiery words of wisdom and a passion for justice, Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., inspired people everywhere to perform extraordinary acts of courage and ignited one of the most influential movements of the twentieth century. This is the definitive collection of eleven of his most powerful sermons, from his earliest known audio recording to his last sermon, delivered days before his assassination. With introductions by renowned theologians and ministers including Reverend Billy Graham and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, filled with moving personal reflections and firsthand accounts of the events surrounding each sermon, A KNOCK AT MIDNIGHT is Dr. King's living voice today -- an irresistible call that resonates and inspires the greatness in us all.
Martin Luther King, Jr. , and the Image of God
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Scholars universally acknowledge the role that Christian belief played in the social movement engendered by Martin Luther King Jr. Yet few have actually delved into the complexity of King's theology itself. The centrality of one aspect of his theology in particular - imago Dei, the belief thathuman beings are made in God's image - has been surprisingly overlooked.In this book, Richard W. Wills Sr. offers a comprehensive analysis of King's appeal for civil rights by investigating his understanding of imago Dei. Wills begins by tracing the evolution of this idea through the history of Christian thought, showing the intellectual sources King drew on inconstructing his own beliefs. Wills then demonstrates how King employed this idea in his civil rights work. The belief that we are all made in God's image was crucial, Wills shows, to King's understanding of human nature and equality. While King shared with many of his black church forebears theview that humanity's creation by God was a powerful argument for the equality of all people, he also took the concept much further. For King, being made in God's image meant that human beings have not only the right but also the power to reshape society and to build a "beloved community" on earth.Though explicitly grounded in Christian faith, the doctrine of imago Dei provided King with a theological rationale that was capable of addressing the needs of the community well beyond the walls of churches.Wills's thorough reconsideration King's thought makes the case for his importance as a theologian. It convincingly demonstrates that the concept of imago Dei formed the heart of his theology and, in turn, that his theology was central to the unfolding of the civil rights movement.
Martin Luther King, Jr. , and the Theology of Resistance
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It has been nearly fifty years since Martin Luther King, Jr., was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. Appraisals of King's contributions began almost immediately and continue to this day. The author explores a great many of King's chief ideas and socio-ethical practices: his concept of a moral universe, his doctrine of human dignity, his belief that not all suffering is redemptive, his brand of personalism, his contribution to the development of social ethics, the inclusion of young people in the movement, sexism as a contradiction to his personalism, the problem of black-on-black violence, and others. The book reveals both the strengths and the limitations in King's theological socio-ethical project, and shows him to have relentlessly applied personalist ideas to organized nonviolent resistance campaigns in order to change the world. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.
Revives My Soul Again
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MLK and the Practice of Spirituality The scholarship on Martin Luther King Jr. is seriously lacking in terms of richly nuanced and revelatory treatments of his spirituality and spiritual life. This book addresses this neglect by focusing on King's life as a paradigm of a deep, vital, engaging, balanced, and contagious spirituality. It shows that the essence of the person King was lies in the quality of his own spiritual journey and how that translated into not only a personal devotional life of prayer, meditation, and fasting but also a public ministry that involved the uplift and empowerment of humanity. Much attention is devoted to King's spiritual leadership, to his sense of the civil rights movement as "a spiritual movement," and to his efforts to rescue humanity from what he termed a perpetual "death of the spirit." Readers encounter a figure who took seriously the personal, interpersonal, and sociopolitical aspects of the Christian faith, thereby figuring prominently in recasting the very definition of spirituality in his time. King's "holistic spirituality" is presented here with a clarity and power fresh for our own generation.
The Seminarian
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Martin Luther King Jr. was a cautious nineteen-year-old rookie preacher when he left Atlanta, Georgia, to attend divinity school up north. At Crozer Theological Seminary, King, or "ML" back then, immediately found himself surrounded by a white staff and white professors. Even his dorm room had once been used by wounded Confederate soldiers during the Civil War. Young ML was a prankster and a late-night, chain-smoking pool player who fell in love with a white woman while facing discrimination from locals. In class, ML performed well, though he demonstrated a habit of plagiarizing that continued throughout his academic career. In his three years at Crozer, King delivered dozens of sermons around the Philadelphia area, had a gun pointed at him (twice) and eventually became student body president. These experiences shaped him into a man ready to take on even greater challenges. The Seminarian is the first definitive, full-length account of King's years as a divinity student. Long passed over by biographers and historians, this period in King's life is vital to understanding the historical figure he soon became.
Toward a Theology of Radical Involvement
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The importance of Toward a Theology of Radical Involvement lies in its focus on the theological and ethical perspective of Martin Luther King, Jr. By examining the multiple, competing images of King in both academia and the public square, Ivory argues that mass public confusion and ambiguity exist today about King's identity. Consequently, the more radical and prophetic thrust of his legacy of thought and action has been blunted. Seeking to resolve the public identity crisis about King, Ivory offers the provocative thesis that King is best understood as a creative theological thinker whose activist rhetoric and emancipatory praxis were thoroughly informed and undergirded by an understanding of God and God's will for history and humanity. Hence the prophetic focus and radical character of King's thought and action culminate in a "theology of radical involvement," which gives rise to an ethic of community. King's perspective raises permanent, generative tensions in the contemporary church, academy, and culture. Ivory thus promotes a re-reading of King that gives due credence to the too-often overlooked but profound level of critical analysis, proactive revolutionary challenge, and the bold transformative vision King inspired.
Children of the Movement: the Sons and Daughters of Martin Luther King Jr. , Malcolm X, Elijah Muhammad, George Wallace, Andrew Young, Julian Bond, Stokely Carmichael, Bob Moses, James Chaney, Elaine Brown, and Others Reveal How the Civil Rights Movement
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Parting the Waters
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First of a 3-volume social history, Parting the Waters is more than a biography of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. during the decade preceding his emergence as a national figure. This 1000-page effort, which won the Pulitzer Prize as well as the National Book Critics Circle Award for General Nonfiction, profiles the key players & events that helped shape the American social landscape following WWII but before the civil-rights movement of the 60s reached its climax.
Pillar of Fire America in the King Years
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Volume two of a three volume history of the American civil rights movement, America in the King Years. This volume takes the reader from the assassination of President Kennedy and describes Martin Luther King's struggle to hold his movement together in the face of factionalism and violence.
At Canaan's Edge
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This book concludes a 3-volume history of American race, violence, and democracy. As the book begins, King and his movement are one decade into an epic struggle for the promises of democracy. The quest to cross Selma's Edmund Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965 engages the conscience of the world, strains the civil rights coalition, and embroils King with the U.S. government. After Selma, freedom workers are murdered, but sharecroppers learn to read, dare to vote, and build their own political party, while Stokely Carmichael leaves the movement in frustration to proclaim his famous Black Power doctrine. King takes nonviolence into Northern urban ghettoes, exposing hatreds and fears no less virulent than those in the South. We watch King bring all his eloquence into dissent from the Vietnam War, and make an embattled decision to concentrate on poverty; we reach Memphis, the garbage workers' strike, and King's assassination.--From publisher description.
From Civil Rights to Human Rights
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Martin Luther King, Jr., is widely celebrated as an American civil rights hero. Yet King's nonviolent opposition to racism, militarism, and economic injustice had deeper roots and more radical implications than is commonly appreciated, Thomas F. Jackson argues in this searching reinterpretation of King's public ministry. Between the 1940's and the 1960's, King was influenced by and in turn reshaped the political cultures of the black freedom movement and democratic left. His vision of unfettered human rights drew on the diverse tenets of the African American social gospel, socialism, left-New Deal liberalism, Gandhian philosophy, and Popular Front internationalism. King's early leadership reached beyond southern desegregation and voting rights.
Nothing Like Sunshine
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Rabbi Ben Kamin has written a definitive personal expression about race, coming of age in the 1960's, a forbidden friendship, and his personal love for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. This is a story that spans a four-decade search for a lost high school chum, a deep misunderstanding, and a coming to terms with an America painfully evolving from the blood of MLK to the promise of Barack Obama. The book is a remembrance of Kamin's life at Cincinnati's notorious Woodward High School, a microcosm
The Murkin Conspiracy
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Hellhound on His Trail
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An Act of State
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Nine Days
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"[An] inspiring book about the events leading up to the 1960 election, from Dr. King's imprisonment to student activism in Atlanta to JFK's campaign. It's a story we can all learn from--a story of overlooked heroes and the power each of us has to create change." --Barack Obama A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice | One of O magazine's best books of February 2021 The authors of Douglass and Lincoln present fully for the first time the story of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s imprisonment in the days leading up to the 1960 presidential election and the efforts of three of John F. Kennedy's civil rights staffers who went rogue to free him--a move that changed the face of the Democratic Party and propelled Kennedy to the White House. Less than three weeks before the 1960 presidential election, thirty-one-year-old Martin Luther King, Jr. was arrested at a sit-in at Rich's Department Store in Atlanta. That day would lead to the first night King had ever spent in jail--and the time that King's family most feared for his life. An earlier, minor traffic ticket served as a pretext for keeping King locked up, and later for a harrowing nighttime transfer to Reidsville, the notorious Georgia state prison where Black inmates worked on chain gangs overseen by violent white guards. While King's imprisonment was decried as a moral scandal in some quarters and celebrated in others, for the two presidential candidates--John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon--it was the ultimate October surprise: an emerging and controversial civil rights leader was languishing behind bars, and the two campaigns raced to decide whether, and how, to respond. Stephen and Paul Kendrick's Nine Days tells the incredible story of what happened next. In 1960, the Civil Rights Movement was growing increasingly inventive and energized while white politicians favored the corrosive tactics of silence and stalling--but an audacious team in the Kennedy campaign's Civil Rights Section (CRS) decided to act. In an election when Black voters seemed poised to split their votes between the candidates, the CRS convinced Kennedy to agitate for King's release, sometimes even going behind his back in their quest to secure his freedom. Over the course of nine extraordinary October days, the leaders of the CRS--pioneering Black journalist Louis Martin, future Pennsylvania senator Harris Wofford, and Sargent Shriver, the founder of the Peace Corps--worked to tilt a tight election in Kennedy's favor and bring about a revolution in party affiliation whose consequences are still integral to the practice of politics today. Based on fresh interviews, newspaper accounts, and extensive archival research, Nine Days is the first full recounting of an event that changed the course of one of the closest elections in American history. Much more than a political thriller, it is also the story of the first time King refused bail and came to terms with the dangerous course of his mission to change a nation. At once a story of electoral machinations, moral courage, and, ultimately, the triumph of a future president's better angels, Nine Days is a gripping tale with important lessons for our own time.
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