David F. Walker

David F. Walker and Marcus Kwame Anderson’s The Black Panther Party: A Graphic Novel History recounts the history of the Black Panthers in the context of the larger twentieth-century Civil Rights movement. The book begins with the long view of Black History in America, tracing the racial inequalities of the United States back to its original sin of slavery and pointing out how efforts to correct that sin, such as the Civil Rights Amendments during Reconstruction, fell short in practice leading to new systems of racial oppression and fledgling efforts to resist that oppression. Walker and Anderson engage with the complex history of the Panthers, from their initial foundation amid various other groups also called the Black Panthers through their early efforts to resist police brutality and their shift toward more community support programs. They also touch on internecine conflict within the organization, some of which occurred at the instigation of the FBI and their COINTELPRO operations. The result is a fully realized picture of the Panthers’ history.

Walker writes in his afterword, “It is worth nothing that, more than 50 years after Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale founded the Black Panther Party and drafted the Ten-Point Program as their guiding manifesto, every single concern they addressed is still relevant. Every single inequality, injustice, and form of oppression impacting the Black community in 1966 is still going strong, well into the 21st century. What the Panthers wanted in 1966, we still want now. What they believed, we still know to be true” (pg. 173). Amid the racial reckoning of 2020 and the inevitable conservative pushback against progressive goals, Walker and Anderson’s The Black Panther Party is a great foundational text for those who want to know more about the organization’s history and the people that shaped its role in society during the revolutionary era of the 1960s and 1970s. As we find ourselves facing another era of great social change, Walker and Anderson’s book is critically vital to learn from the past in order to improve the future. Finally, Walker and Anderson’s careful research makes this a useful text for history teachers to help their students engage with the history of the Black Panthers and their place in the larger Civil Rights Movement.… (more)

I am a newbie when it comes to the history of America or on the topic of slavery or the American Civil War. But what I love about the American pop-culture like movies or graphic novels is that they make all these topics in a fascinating and extremely accessible manner to a layperson like me.

I have been hearing about the name "Frederick Douglass" in my social media feed for quite a while. So a graphic novel on him really intrigued me, as it is relatively easy to read and finish it. This book is such a great and quick primer into the era of slavery, American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln through the lens of Frederick Douglass. For a complete newbie like me, this was a fantastic crash course of history on the perils of slavery and the formation of USA.

I was able to relate to a similar person in India's history, Periyar (EV Ramasamy) with Frederick Douglass.

When Frederick's youth is faced with the brutality of slavery, Periyar experienced the cruelty of casteism & brahmin dominance. Periyar was economically well to do and privileged, Frederick had good circle friends with which he could even move to England and pay and free himself from the slave masters.

If Frederick was known for the abolition of slavery, Periyar was known for his atheism and rationality movement. But when slavery was getting addressed, Frederick lent his voice for the woman suffrage. Periyar very vocal and known for fighting for equality for women.

Both of them lived longer in their old ages and remarried a much younger woman. Both of them had written a lot, ran a newspaper and spoke vociferously for the cause they stood. Both of them had their imprints and influence in history for their countrymen.

It may look like a cursory comparison, but I couldn't avoid it when reading this graphic novel. Highly recommend it, if you are curious about the politics and history of USA.… (more)