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Summary
- Early Life, Education and Postgraduate Work
- Involvement in a Homicide Case
- Prison Reform, Academic Life and Activism
Key Facts And Information
Let’s find out more about Angela Davis!
Angela Davis, an educator, activist, and author, became famous due to her participation in several protests that aimed to advance the issues and discussions about segregation. During her younger years, she joined an all-Black faction of the Communist Party. She became prominent due to her involvement in a politically significant homicide case during the early 1970s. Davis was indicted for her alleged involvement in the unsuccessful escape attempt of incarcerated Black radical George Jackson and subsequently spent approximately eighteen months in prison prior to her acquittal in 1972.
Angela Davis
EARLY LIFE, EDUCATION & POSTGRADUATE WORK OF ANGELA DAVIS
- Angela Davis was born on 26 January 1944, in Birmingham, Alabama. Her family resided in the neighbourhood known as Dynamite Hill, a locale that, during the 1950s, was characterised by the bombardment of residences as a means of intimidation aimed at displacing middle-class African American individuals who had settled in the area. Davis has two brothers, Ben and Reginald, and a sister, Fania. Davis periodically engaged in activities on her uncle’s farm and socialised with acquaintances in New York City.
- Davis attended Carrie A. Tuggle School, a segregated black elementary school, and later, Parker Annex, a middle-school branch of Parker High School in Birmingham.
- As a child, Davis was raised in an environment surrounded by communist organisers and intellectuals, who immensely contributed to her principles as an African American woman.
- One of Davis’ early inspirations for her works was her mother, Sallye Bell Davis, who served as a national officer and principal organiser of the Southern Negro Youth Congress. The Southern Negro Youth Congress organisation was influenced by the Communist Party and sought to foster alliances among African Americans in the Southern United States.
- Davis was an active church member and the Girl Scouts of the United States of America. As a member of the Girl Scouts, Davis advocated against racial segregation in Birmingham.
- By her junior year of high school, Davis had been accepted into a programme administered by the American Friends Service Committee (Quaker), which facilitated the placement of Black students from the South into integrated institutions in the North.
- She selected Elisabeth Irwin High School in Greenwich Village and was enlisted by a communist student organisation known as Advance.
- In college, Davis attended Brandeis University in Massachusetts, where she was one of three African American students in her class. In her second year, Davis decided to major in French.
- Davis stayed for a while in Biarritz when she learned of the 1963 Birmingham church bombing, committed by members of the white supremacist group Ku Klux Klan, in which four African American girls were killed; Davis had been personally acquainted with the victims.
- Davis became a member of the Che-Lumumba Club, an exclusively African American faction of the Communist Party USA, named in honour of the revolutionary figures Che Guevara of Cuba and Patrice Lumumba of the Congo. Davis obtained a master’s degree from the University of California, San Diego, in 1968. She undertook research for a PhD at the University of California, San Diego, in 1970; however, she did not obtain a degree due to the confiscation of her manuscripts by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
- Commencing in 1969, Davis served as an interim assistant professor in the philosophy department at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Despite efforts from both Princeton and Swarthmore to recruit her, she ultimately chose UCLA due to its urban setting. At that time, she was recognised as a radical feminist and activist, a member of the Communist Party USA, and an associate of the Los Angeles chapter of the Black Panther Party.
An issue of the Black Panther Party newspaper from July 1970.
- Davis had previously affiliated herself with the Communist Party in 1968. Subsequently, he became a member of the Black Panther Party, where she contributed to a branch located in Los Angeles, overseeing political education initiatives.
- When the leadership of the Black Panther Party concluded that its members could not simultaneously belong to other political organisations, Davis chose to maintain her membership in the Communist Party while continuing her collaboration with the Black Panther Party.
- In 1969, the University of California implemented a policy prohibiting employing individuals affiliated with Communism. During the meeting held on September 19 1969, the Board of Regents terminated Davis from her position, which paid $10,000 annually, due to her affiliation with the Communist Party, a decision influenced by California Governor at that time, Ronald Reagan.
- Davis was dismissed; however, she contested the decision in court and successfully regained her employment. Davis ultimately departed upon the expiration of her contract in 1970.
- Beyond academia, Davis emerged as a fervent advocate for three inmates at Soledad Prison, collectively called the Soledad Brothers, despite their lack of familial ties.
- The Soledad Brothers (John W. Cluchette, Fleeta Drumgo, and George Lester Jackson) were charged with the homicide of a prison officer following the fatalities of several African American inmates during a confrontation instigated by another guard. Some individuals believed that these prisoners were being utilised as scapegoats due to the political activities occurring within the institution.
INVOLVEMENT IN A HOMICIDE CASE
- In 1970, Jonathan Peter Jackson attempted to liberate his brother, George Lester Jackson, a member of the Black Panther Party and one of the Soledad Brothers, by illicitly introducing firearms into the Marin County courthouse during the trial of another Black Panther. This act involved arming fellow inmates and taking the judge, the deputy district attorney and three jurors captive. The judge was killed during their escape. Davis who had affiliations with the Jackson siblings and was the registered owner of the firearms used in the incident, faced charges of murder, kidnapping, and conspiracy.
- Shortly after the judge issued the warrant on 14 August 1970, an extensive operation to locate and apprehend Davis was initiated. On 18 August, four days after the warrant issuance, Federal Bureau of Investigation Director J. Edgar Hoover included Davis on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives List.
- Shortly thereafter, Davis became a fugitive and absconded from California. On 13 October 1970, Federal Bureau of Investigation agents located her at a Howard Johnson Motor Lodge in New York City. During her confinement at the Women’s Detention Centre, Davis was initially placed in solitary detention, thereby being segregated from the other inmates. With the assistance of her legal team, she secured a federal court order to be released from the segregated area.
- Throughout the nation, thousands commenced the organisation of a movement to secure her release. In 1972, following a period of incarceration lasting 16 months, the state permitted her release on bond from the county jail.
- On 4 June 1972, after 13 hours of deliberations, the all-white jury returned a verdict of not guilty.
- After the verdict, one juror, Ralph DeLange, performed the Black Power salute in the presence of a gathering of spectators. He subsequently informed reporters that this gesture was intended to signify a unity of opinion for all oppressed individuals. Ten jurors subsequently attended victory celebrations with the defence.
- The ownership of the firearms utilised in the criminal act was deemed inadequate to substantiate her involvement in the conspiracy. She was represented by Howard Moore Jr. and Leo Branton Jr., who engaged psychologists to assist the defence in identifying members of the jury pool who might be predisposed to support their arguments. This strategy has since gained prevalence. They additionally engaged specialists to undermine the credibility of eyewitness testimonies.
PRISON REFORM, ACADEMIC LIFE AND ACTIVISM OF ANGELA DAVIS
- Davis has consistently intensified her advocacies in prison reform throughout the years. She presented at various events and academic conferences to reinforce her argument, including one held at the University of Virginia in 2009. According to UVA Today, a gathering of thirty scholars and other individuals, including Davis, convened to discuss “the expansion of the prison-industrial complex and the racial disparities present in the United States.”
- Acknowledging her initial engagement in anti-prison activism in the 1960s, she contended that it is imperative to initiate a substantive national discourse regarding the abolition of these institutions, which “contribute to the marginalisation of an increasing number of individuals from racially oppressed communities, subjecting them to an isolated existence characterised predominantly by authoritarian governance, violence, disease, and mechanisms of seclusion.”
- Davis was an instructor in the Ethnic Studies department at San Francisco State University from 1980 to 1984. Despite former Governor Reagan’s assertion that she would never again engage in teaching within the University of California system, “Davis was reinstated following a significant outcry from scholars and civil rights advocates,” as J.M. Brown of the Santa Cruz Sentinel reported.
- Davis was appointed to the History of Consciousness Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 1984 and attained the rank of professor in 1991.
- Throughout her tenure, she remained actively engaged as an advocate, championing women’s rights and racial justice. She has authored several publications addressing the themes of ethnicity, class, and gender, including notable works such as “The Meaning of Freedom” and “Women, Culture & Politics.”
- Upon her retirement from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 2008, Davis was conferred the title of professor emerita. In the intervening years, she has persistently advanced her efforts in prison abolition, women’s rights, and racial justice. Davis has served as an educator at UCLA and other institutions in the capacity of a visiting professor, demonstrating a steadfast commitment to the principle of “liberating minds as well as liberating society.”
- On 31 October 2011, Davis delivered remarks at the Occupy Wall Street assemblies in Philadelphia and Washington Square. Due to electronic amplification limitations, her remarks were conveyed through human microphones.
- In 2012, Davis received the 2011 Blue Planet Award, conferred in recognition of significant contributions to humanity and the environment. During the 27th Empowering Women of Colour Conference in 2012, Davis declared her adherence to a vegan lifestyle.
- She has advocated for the release of Rasmea Odeh, the associate director of the Arab American Action Network, who was found guilty of immigration fraud due to her concealment of a prior homicide conviction.
- Davis served as an honorary co-chair for the Women’s March on Washington, which took place on 21 January 2017, the day following the inauguration of President Donald Trump. On 16 October 2018, Dalhousie University, located in Halifax, Nova Scotia, conferred upon Davis an honorary degree during the inaugural Viola Desmond Legacy Lecture, part of the university’s bicentennial commemoration.
- On 7 January 2019, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute (BCRI) revoked Davis’s Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award, stating that she “does not fulfil all of the requisite criteria.” In November 2019, Davis, alongside various other prominent individuals, affixed his signature to a letter expressing support for Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn and endorsed him during the 2019 United Kingdom general election.
- On 20 January 2020, Davis delivered the Memorial Keynote Address at the Martin Luther King Jr. Symposium at the University of Michigan. In 2021, Davis was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
- In 2020, she was recognised as the 1971 “Woman of the Year” in the special edition of Time magazine entitled “100 Women of the Year.” In 2020, she was recognised as one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential individuals globally.
- Throughout her extensive career in activism and scholarship spanning several decades, Angela Y. Davis has been profoundly engaged in global movements advocating for social justice.
- Her professional endeavours as an educator—both within the university context and in the broader public domain—have consistently underscored the significance of fostering communities dedicated to pursuing economic, ethnic, and gender justice.
Frequently Asked Questions About Angela Davis
- Who is Angela Davis?
Angela Davis is an American political activist, scholar, and author known for her work in civil rights, feminism, prison abolition, and Black liberation movements.
- What is Angela Davis famous for?
She is famous for her activism in the 1960s and 1970s, her association with the Black Panther Party, and her involvement in the prison abolition movement. She also gained national attention when arrested and later acquitted in a high-profile trial.
- What role did Angela Davis play in the civil rights movement?
Davis was an outspoken advocate for racial justice, prison reform, and economic equality. She was involved with the Communist Party USA and was a prominent figure in movements opposing racial discrimination and systemic oppression.