The souls of black folk

W.E.B Du Bois and the Souls of Black Folk

Du Bois (1868-1963) was the author of the Souls of Black Folk (1903), a book about past and present black-white relations in the United States. The book describes Du Bois' views of ways of achieving equality among American blacks and whites for the benefit of all in society. According to Gerald G. Hynes: "William Edward Burghardt DuBois, to his admirers, was by spirited devotion and scholarly dedication, an attacker of injustice and a defender of freedom"("A Biographical Sketch of W.E.B. DuBois"). According to Lucid Cafe, W.E.B. Du Bois "was one of the most influential black leaders of the first half of the 20th Century. Dubois shared in the founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP, in 1909. He served as its director of research and editor of its magazine, "Crisis," until 1934." W.E.B. Du Bois was considered by some to be a radical in his day, although many of his ideas, in the Souls of Black Folk, have in fact stood the test of time.).

In this essay, I will analyze W.E.B. Du Bois' book the Souls of Black Folk, its author, and its social influence.

According to "The Souls of Black Folk" (Bartleby.com):

W.E.B. Du Bois said, on the launch of his groundbreaking 1903 treatise the Souls of Black Folk, "for the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line" -- a prescient statement. Setting out to show to the reader "the strange meaning of being black here in the dawning of the Twentieth Century," Du Bois explains the meaning of the emancipation, and its effect, and his views on the role of the leaders of his race.

W.E.B. Du Bois was born in Massachusetts in 1868, three years after Abolition made slavery illegal anywhere in the United States. His family was free, but of modest means. W.E.B. Du Bois was educated in Massachusetts public schools, alongside white children his age, and only learned he was perceived as "different" from them when one of his elementary school classmates told him so. ("Du Bois, W.E.B.," Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia) Perhaps most importantly, Du Bois never knew Southern life or slavery, unlike Booker T. Washington, who would become Du Bois' rival in terms of ideas about black-white relations and the road to equality for blacks in America ("Du Bois, W.E.B.," Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia

W.E.B. Du Bois' own educational background including Fisk and Harvard, and Du Bois was the first African-American ever to earn a Harvard University doctorate ("Du Bois, W.E.B.," Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia). "Du Bois attended Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, and then went on to Harvard, where he graduated cum laude in 1890 (Mc Quade et al., p. 781). Perhaps because of his own educational experiences, W.E.B. Du Bois strongly believed that education for blacks should be academic in focus (rather than vocational) like that of whites, so that blacks could then become, through educational equality, equal to whites in every way. While Booker T. Washington (Du Bois' rival of the time in terms of their ideas on black-white equality) (Up from Slavery) believed, first and foremost, in vocational training for black as a way for them to be self-sufficient ("Booker T. Washington Delivers the 1895 Atlanta Compromise Speech"), Du Bois felt racial inequality was a flaw in American society that hurt everyone, and that whites and blacks should work equally to fix it.

All of society, therefore, must work together toward this goal, Du Bois believed.

In southern states before Abolition, various laws within each state for and about slaves, known as "Slave Codes" decreed that teaching slaves to read or write was illegal. Among the Georgia Slave Codes of 1848, "Punishment for teaching slaves or free persons of color to read" is described as follows:

If any slave, Negro, or free person of color, or any white person, shall teach any other slave, Negro, or free person of color, to read or write either written or printed characters the said free person of color or slave shall be punished by fine an whipping, or fine or whipping, at the discretion of the court (Randall, 2001).

Even after Abolition, however, such basic educational discrimination continued to manifest itself, if less overtly, within the unique economic, social, and class challenges faced by multiple generations of the slaves' descendents (Fox-Genovese, 1988, p. 338).

Du Bois summarizes his disagreement with Booker T. Washington, on the way forward for blacks in the early years of the 20th century, within the following statement, from "Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others" (from the Souls of Black Folk):

His [Washington's] doctrine has tended to make the whites, North and South, shift the burden of the Negro problem to the Negro's shoulders and stand aside as critical and rather pessimistic spectators; when in fact the burden belongs to the nation, and the hands of none of us are clean if we bend not our energies to righting these great wrongs (p. 51).

Within the Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B. Dubois further suggests that, African- Americans need only have equal educational opportunities and tools, combined with chances for interpersonal, educational, and professional associations with whites, to enable them to reach equality. Many of today's Affirmative Action policies reflect the ideas of W.E.B. Du Bois. Du Bois believed that a feeling of ethnic equality may only be gained first through education and experience, and second, based on self-image and the [non-prejudiced] perceptions of others. Therefore, blacks and whites must work together toward this goal.

As W.E.B. Du Bois further states, within "The College-bred Community":

What the Negro needs..., he must largely teach himself... what he learns of social organization..., he must learn from his own people.

A social uplift and philanthropy must come from within his own ranks, and he must above all make and set and follow his own ideals of life and character [italics added]. Now, this is putting upon a people just emerged from slavery, with neither time, tradition, nor experience [italics added], a tremendous task. In strict justice, it is asking more of this people than the American nation has any right to ask. Nevertheless, this race is not stopping to await justice...; it is not asking about the righteousness of past conduct; it is not even pausing -- as perhaps it ought -- to discuss the advisability of present policies; but it is asking you, here and now, to place in its hands the indispensable facilities for teaching itself those things... It must know... To share modern civilization italics added]. (in the Education of Black People: Ten Critiques, 1906-1960 by W.E.B. DuBois [sic]. a. Aptheker (Ed.). Amherst, Massachusetts: The University of Amherst Press, 1973, 31-40.)