Women's Role in Civil Rights Movement
During the Civil Rights Movement, women fought for justice for all victims of political and legal isolation, like African-Americans, other women and the poor.
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History
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Rosa Parks, an African-American and NAACP member, helped launch civil rights into a movement when she refused to give up her seat so a white person could sit down. Although standard history books say the movement ended after the Voting Rights Act in 1967, sex equality was a battle throughout the 1970s, when laws protected funding for women's sports and commensurate pay with men.
Significance
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Women's roles in advancing their own equality (and others) extends throughout America's history, from Jane Addams at the turn of the 20th century to Eleanor Roosevelt in the 1930s and 1940s. In 1938, Eleanor Roosevelt resigned from the Daughters of the Revolution because they refused to allow black singer Marion Anderson in the group's Washington D.C. auditorium.
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Famous Women
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Ella Baker communicated to all people that their help was needed, and that the civil rights movement wasn't only for the middle class. She gave people strength to achieve a shared goal. Fannie Lou Hamer was the Vice-Chair of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and challenged state and federal legislators on their anti-civil rights platforms.
Expert Insight
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Katherine J. Kennedy, director of Boston University's Howard Thurman Center--which organizes human rights programs on campus--told MSNBC that most women in the movement were not well-known. "Most were volunteers---women in the churches who cooked the meals and made sure all the preparations were made, the ones who cleaned up after the rallies and got ready for the next one," Kennedy said.
Benefits
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Septima Poinsette Clark directed the teaching and education programs at the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which helped underrepresented Americans learn how to sign checks and complete voter registration forms. Her Citizenship Schools used literacy and organizing skill sets to develop more local leaders for the movement and increase American reading rates overall.
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