Booker T. Washington & W.E.B. Du Bois

Booker T. Washington (1856-1915)

• Born into slavery, to a slave mother and a white father.

• Educated at Hampton University

• Gained national attention with his Atlanta Address of 1895

• Head of the Tuskegee Institute from 1881-1915

Booker T. Washington (1856-1915)

• Believed that African-Americans should focus on industrial education as those were the jobs primarily available to them.

• Employment and accumulation of wealth would create a stable base, allowing future generations to gradually claim more rights.

Atlanta Address of 1895 (The Atlanta Compromise)

• Agreement between leaders of black and white communities in the South

• Essential elements: • Blacks would not ask for the right to vote.• Would not retaliate against racist behaviour.• Must tolerate segregation.• Blacks would receive free basic education, limited to

industrial and vocational schools. No college education.

W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963)

• Co-founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)

• 1st African-American to earn a doctorate from Harvard

W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963)

• Believed that a liberal education would better serve the Black community because it is used to develop the elite.

• Argued that people should be fighting for equal rights, rather than passively accepting their inequality.

DEBATE!

•Which author had the more achievable strategy for civil rights?

DEBATE!

• Washington vs. Du Bois

• Structure: • Opening remarks: Present why your strategy will succeed,

why the other side will fail.

• Point/Counterpoint.

• Concluding remarks.