My People Are Rising
Memoir of a Black Panther Party Captain
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4.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
The founder of the Black Panther Party’s Seattle chapter recounts his life on the frontlines of the Black Power Revolution.
Growing up in Seattle in the 1960s, Aaron Dixon dedicated himself to the Civil Rights movement at an early age. As a teenager, he joined Martin Luther King on marches to end housing discrimination and volunteered to help integrate schools. After King’s assassination in 1968, Dixon continued his activism by starting the Seattle chapter of the Black Panther Party at the age of nineteen.
In My People Are Rising, Dixon offers a candid account of life in the Black Panther Party. Through his eyes, we see the courage of a generation that stood up to injustice, their political triumphs and tragedies, and the unforgettable legacy of Black Power.
“This book is a moving memoir experience: a must read. The dramatic life cycle rise of a youthful sixties political revolutionary, my friend Aaron Dixon.” —Bobby Seale, founding chairman and national organizer of the Black Panther Party, 1966 to 1974
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The cofounder of the Seattle chapter of the Black Panther Party shares his personal journey through 10 years of the party's rise and fall, tracing the Black Power movement from 1968 through the late '70s. At age 18, inspired by Stokely Carmichael and Bobby Seale, distressed over the murder of Martin Luther King Jr., and rebellious, Dixon was swept enthusiastically into a leadership role in the party that fed his passion for political education and helping the black community, while allowing him to participate in stockpiling weapons and fighting against both local white police "pigs" and a U.S. government that saw the militarized Panthers as a serious threat. Dixon paints an intense picture of the party's next decade, from youth recruitment, through the purge of members involved in criminal activities, and finally to the split between those who wanted to work within the political system and those who felt it was time for a violent revolution. Dixon's deeply personal writing humanizes the movement: his pride in the success of social programs like free breakfast for school children coexists with his disillusionment and disappointment as top members are lost to incarceration, murder, and especially to internal disagreements and corruption, threatening both the survival of the organization and Dixon's personal ideals. Photos.
