Short Discussion

ocial movements have been a part of the history of the US – indeed the beginning of the US and break with England that began in 1776 (sometimes known as the Revolutionary War) was a social movement.  Certainly one of the most important movements in contemporary US was the culmination of the Civil Rights Movement, the century of segregation that followed the Emancipation Proclamation..
In 1954, the Supreme Court ‘officially’ found that segregation was unconstitutional. Yet, it took bus boycotts, sit-ins and freedom marches to effect real change in the US and finally the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 for Segregation to be officially banned. Other issues, like freedom to marry someone of a different race took even longer.

Go to this site –  https://www.tellingstories.org/ (links to an external site) and find and read about 2 individuals who were active in the US Civil Rights Movement (other than Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. – do not use these individuals).  Another site that has a collection of oral histories from the civil rights movement is the Library of Congress –  https://www.loc.gov/collections/civil-rights-history-project/about-this-collection/ (Links to an external site.) (links to an external site)

Find at least one other biographical source for the individuals you selected (and document both) and provide the following –

(1)  Summarize their roles in the civil rights movement.

(2)  What motivated the people you selected to become active in the movement?

(3)  What was the significance of their contributions?

(4)  What did you learn (new information) about the Civil Rights Movement that helps you understand social movements?