What do you think?
Rate this book
Lectures On Liberation
Angela Davis' Lectures on Liberation pamphlet
Presented here are Professor Angela Davis' initial lectures for "Recurring Philosophical Themes in Black Literature," her first course at UCLA, taught during the Fall Quarter of 1969. At the time she was beginning a two-year appointment as Acting
Assistant Professor in Philosophy, an appointment duly recommended by the Department of Philosophy and enthusiastically approved by the UCLA Administration. The first of the two lectures
was delivered in Royce Hall to an audience of over fifteen hundred students and interested colleagues. At the lecture's end Professor Davis was given a prolonged standing ovation by the audience. It was, we thought, a vindication of academic freedom
and democratic education. For the lectures are part of an attempt to bring to light the forbidden history of the enslavement and oppression of black people, and to place that history in an illuminating philosophical context. At the same time, they
are sensitive, original and incisive: the work of an excellent teacher and a truly fine scholar.
Around this time Professor Davis is a prisoner of the society that should have welcomed her talents, her honesty and the contribution she was making toward understanding and resolving the most critical problem of that society—the division between its oppressors and its oppressed. First she was attacked by the Regents of the
University of California, who attempted to dismiss her from the University on the patently illegal ground of her membership in the Communist Party. When this attempt was overruled by the
Superior Court of Los Angeles, the Regents denied her the normal continuation of her appointment for a second year, in spite of recommendations from a host of review committees and the Chancellor of UCLA that she be reappointed. During the summer
of 1970, she was charged with kidnapping. murder, and unlawful flight to avoid prosecution. and was placed on the FBI most wanted list. When apprehended, she was held on excessive bail,
then denied bail, and subsequently has been kept in isolation from other prisoners. In her first lecture Professor Davis points out that keeping
an oppressed class in ignorance is one of the principal instruments of its oppression. Like Frederick Douglass, the black slave whose life and work she surveys here, Professor Davis is
one of the educated oppressed. Like him, she has achieved full consciousness of what it is to be oppressed, and has heightened this consciousness in her own people and in others. There can
be little doubt that her effectiveness in blunting the oppressive weapon of ignorance was the chief motive for her removal from the University of California, and a major motive in the harsh
treatment she has since received. These are lectures dealing with the phenomenology of oppression
and liberation. It is one thing to make the elementary point that millions are still oppressed in what is advertised as the world's most free society. It is much more difficult to lay out the causes of that oppression and the ways in which it is perpetuated; its psychological meaning to the oppressor and the
oppressed; and the process by which the latter becomes conscious of it; and the way in which they triumph over it. This was the task Professor Davis set for herself. She brings to her work a rich philosophical background, a piercing intellect and
the knowledge born of experience.
It was perhaps inevitable that Professor Davis should become a symbol for conflicting groups and causes. But it is well to remember that behind the symbol lies the human being; whose
thoughts are recorded here, and that when she stands trial not only a human cause but also a human life will be tried. In the
meantime, we take pride in presenting these two lectures by a distinguished colleague and friend. May they everywhere contribute to the defeat of oppression. (1971 Introduction)
an HONORABLE pamphlet of political activist, academic scholar, and author Angela Yvonne Davis
24 Pages
Black History Studies, Slavery, Black Consciousness, Justice
Download and Read Link:
https://archive.org/details/AngelaDav...
Presented here are Professor Angela Davis' initial lectures for "Recurring Philosophical Themes in Black Literature," her first course at UCLA, taught during the Fall Quarter of 1969. At the time she was beginning a two-year appointment as Acting
Assistant Professor in Philosophy, an appointment duly recommended by the Department of Philosophy and enthusiastically approved by the UCLA Administration. The first of the two lectures
was delivered in Royce Hall to an audience of over fifteen hundred students and interested colleagues. At the lecture's end Professor Davis was given a prolonged standing ovation by the audience. It was, we thought, a vindication of academic freedom
and democratic education. For the lectures are part of an attempt to bring to light the forbidden history of the enslavement and oppression of black people, and to place that history in an illuminating philosophical context. At the same time, they
are sensitive, original and incisive: the work of an excellent teacher and a truly fine scholar.
Around this time Professor Davis is a prisoner of the society that should have welcomed her talents, her honesty and the contribution she was making toward understanding and resolving the most critical problem of that society—the division between its oppressors and its oppressed. First she was attacked by the Regents of the
University of California, who attempted to dismiss her from the University on the patently illegal ground of her membership in the Communist Party. When this attempt was overruled by the
Superior Court of Los Angeles, the Regents denied her the normal continuation of her appointment for a second year, in spite of recommendations from a host of review committees and the Chancellor of UCLA that she be reappointed. During the summer
of 1970, she was charged with kidnapping. murder, and unlawful flight to avoid prosecution. and was placed on the FBI most wanted list. When apprehended, she was held on excessive bail,
then denied bail, and subsequently has been kept in isolation from other prisoners. In her first lecture Professor Davis points out that keeping
an oppressed class in ignorance is one of the principal instruments of its oppression. Like Frederick Douglass, the black slave whose life and work she surveys here, Professor Davis is
one of the educated oppressed. Like him, she has achieved full consciousness of what it is to be oppressed, and has heightened this consciousness in her own people and in others. There can
be little doubt that her effectiveness in blunting the oppressive weapon of ignorance was the chief motive for her removal from the University of California, and a major motive in the harsh
treatment she has since received. These are lectures dealing with the phenomenology of oppression
and liberation. It is one thing to make the elementary point that millions are still oppressed in what is advertised as the world's most free society. It is much more difficult to lay out the causes of that oppression and the ways in which it is perpetuated; its psychological meaning to the oppressor and the
oppressed; and the process by which the latter becomes conscious of it; and the way in which they triumph over it. This was the task Professor Davis set for herself. She brings to her work a rich philosophical background, a piercing intellect and
the knowledge born of experience.
It was perhaps inevitable that Professor Davis should become a symbol for conflicting groups and causes. But it is well to remember that behind the symbol lies the human being; whose
thoughts are recorded here, and that when she stands trial not only a human cause but also a human life will be tried. In the
meantime, we take pride in presenting these two lectures by a distinguished colleague and friend. May they everywhere contribute to the defeat of oppression. (1971 Introduction)
an HONORABLE pamphlet of political activist, academic scholar, and author Angela Yvonne Davis
24 Pages
Black History Studies, Slavery, Black Consciousness, Justice
Download and Read Link:
https://archive.org/details/AngelaDav...
24 pages, Unknown Binding
Published January 1, 1971
1 person is currently reading
647 people want to read
About the author
Angela Y. Davis
126 books7,611 followersAngela Yvonne Davis is an American political activist, scholar, and author. She emerged as a nationally prominent activist and radical in the 1960s, as a leader of the Communist Party USA, and had close relations with the Black Panther Party through her involvement in the Civil Rights Movement despite never being an official member of the party. Prisoner rights have been among her continuing interests; she is the founder of Critical Resistance, an organization working to abolish the prison-industrial complex. She is a retired professor with the History of Consciousness Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and is the former director of the university's Feminist Studies department.
Her research interests are in feminism, African American studies, critical theory, Marxism, popular music, social consciousness, and the philosophy and history of punishment and prisons. Her membership in the Communist Party led to Ronald Reagan's request in 1969 to have her barred from teaching at any university in the State of California. She was tried and acquitted of suspected involvement in the Soledad brothers' August 1970 abduction and murder of Judge Harold Haley in Marin County, California. She was twice a candidate for Vice President on the Communist Party USA ticket during the 1980s.
Her research interests are in feminism, African American studies, critical theory, Marxism, popular music, social consciousness, and the philosophy and history of punishment and prisons. Her membership in the Communist Party led to Ronald Reagan's request in 1969 to have her barred from teaching at any university in the State of California. She was tried and acquitted of suspected involvement in the Soledad brothers' August 1970 abduction and murder of Judge Harold Haley in Marin County, California. She was twice a candidate for Vice President on the Communist Party USA ticket during the 1980s.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 12, 2023
"Philosophy is supposed to perform the task of generalizing aspects of experience, and not just for the sake of formulating generalizations, of discovering formulas as some of my colleagues in the discipline believe. My idea of philosophy is that if it is not relevant to human problems, if it does not tell us how we can go about eradicating some of the misery in this world, then it is not worth the name of philosophy. I think that Socrates made a very profound statement when he asserted that the raison d'etre of phil-osophy is to teach us proper living. In this day and age "proper living" means liberation from the urgent problems of poverty, economic necessity and indoctrination, mental oppression." (14)
June 4, 2020
"Moreover, it is not just his individual condition that the slave rejects and thus his misery is not just a result of his individual un-freedom, his individual alienation. True consciousness is the rejection of the institution itself and everything which accompanies it."
April 12, 2024
I recently read this for my Ecological Crisis and Human Freedom class. This is the first work I have read of Angela Davis (as an Anthropology major this is embarrassing), and I am inspired to read so much more. She is brilliant - an evocative speaker on social justice, humanity, and feminism. It was wonderful to read these lectures.
Read
October 9, 2020**did not rate as it is not my place to rate lectures and opinion pieces**
July 13, 2017
Angela Davis is an amazing woman who did her research, in reading this pamphlet it enlightened me and added more clarity to the conscious reality of blacks in Western Society. She drew on historical references and in understanding true liberation is 'resistance' / 'rejection' of captivity-- mentally and in some cases physically-- we are that much closer to amplifying the word 'freedom'. Although this was written in 1969--in parallel to the lectures Angela gave during that time--this pamphlet still is helpful to today's black community or any person looking to grasp a better vision of real freedom.
March 1, 2025
Angela Davis' Lectures on Liberation is a series of lectures from her 1969 course at UCLA, "Recurring Philosophical Themes in Black Literature." The lectures focus on the philosophical and historical analysis of oppression, resistance, and liberation, particularly within the context of Black literature and history.
Key themes include:
1. The paradox of freedom: While Western philosophy idealizes freedom, real-world institutions like slavery contradict these ideals.
2. The role of Black literature: It provides a deeper understanding of freedom by exposing the failure of theoretical formulations that ignore lived oppression.
3. Resistance as liberation: Davis emphasizes that freedom is not static but an active struggle, citing figures like Frederick Douglass and Nat Turner.
4. The hypocrisy of religion: She critiques how Christianity was used to justify slavery but also notes how some enslaved individuals reclaimed it as a source of resistance.
5. The dialectic of master and slave: Drawing from Hegel, she argues that the master is dependent on the slave for his power, and resistance can shift these dynamics.
6. Alienation: Enslaved people were treated as property, forced into a non-human existence, yet their resistance—both physical and intellectual—challenged this status.
7. Davis connects these historical and philosophical insights to contemporary struggles, arguing that the lessons of past resistance are essential for present-day liberation movements.
Key themes include:
1. The paradox of freedom: While Western philosophy idealizes freedom, real-world institutions like slavery contradict these ideals.
2. The role of Black literature: It provides a deeper understanding of freedom by exposing the failure of theoretical formulations that ignore lived oppression.
3. Resistance as liberation: Davis emphasizes that freedom is not static but an active struggle, citing figures like Frederick Douglass and Nat Turner.
4. The hypocrisy of religion: She critiques how Christianity was used to justify slavery but also notes how some enslaved individuals reclaimed it as a source of resistance.
5. The dialectic of master and slave: Drawing from Hegel, she argues that the master is dependent on the slave for his power, and resistance can shift these dynamics.
6. Alienation: Enslaved people were treated as property, forced into a non-human existence, yet their resistance—both physical and intellectual—challenged this status.
7. Davis connects these historical and philosophical insights to contemporary struggles, arguing that the lessons of past resistance are essential for present-day liberation movements.
August 20, 2023
"Is man free or is he not? Ought he be free or ought not he be free? The history of Black Literature provides, in my opinion, a much more illuminating account of the nature of freedom , its extent and limits, than all the philosophical discourses on this theme in the history of Western society. Why? For a number of reasons. First of all, because Black Literature in this country and throughout the world projects the consciousness of a people who have been denied entrance into the real world of freedom. Black people have exposed, by their very existence, the inadequacies not only of the practice of freedom, but of its very theoretical formulation."
May 30, 2023
“The slave, the black man, the chicano and oppressed whites are much more aware of alienation, perhaps not as a philosophical concept, but as a fact of their daily existence.”
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews