In honor of the 126th anniversary of Harry Haywood's birth, we're reposting this article originally published on Liberation School in 2014. Harry Haywood was a long time member and leader of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) and other communist organizations from the...
Thomas Sankara to comrade Mongo Beti: “Fatherland or death, we will win!”
Liberation School introduction This is the first English translation of a 1985 interview with Thomas Sankara conducted by Mongo Beti, which remained unpublished until Beti's spouse, Odile Tobner, gave the handwritten notes to Bruno Jaffré, who first published it in...
The revolutionary origins of Memorial Day and its political hijacking
A day celebrating Black liberation utilized for white supremacy Editor's note: This article was previously published on Liberation News in 2012. What we now know as Memorial Day began as "Decoration Day" in the immediate aftermath of the U.S. Civil War. It was a...
Liu Liangmo: China’s anti-imperialist, anti-racist, Christian revolutionary (pt. 2)
This is the second of a two-part series on Liu Liangmo. You can find the first part here. Introduction Liu Liangmo’s story is as remarkable as it is unknown. An anti-imperialist, pro-Communist Christian, with a significant relationship to the Black Liberation Movement...
Liu Liangmo: China’s anti-imperialist, anti-racist, Christian revolutionary (pt. 1)
This is the first of a two-part series on Liu Liangmo. You can find the second part here. Introduction Liu Liangmo (1909-1988) was a prominent Chinese anti-imperialist, religious leader and, from 1942-1945, columnist for the Pittsburgh Courier—at that time the...
Two years after the revolution: Thomas Sankara on Franco-African relations
Liberation School introduction This is the first English translation of an interview with Thomas Sankara, originally published here in French under the title, “We vote for Le Pen too much in Ouagadougou.” The interview took place on August 5, 1985 and was first...
“Shelby County v. Holder:” How the Supreme Court attacked Black voting rights
Editor’s note: Beginning with overturning Roe v. Wade, the ultra right-wing Supreme Court continues to attack hard-won and elementary democratic rights in the United States, from affirmative action to the Indian Child Welfare Act. The following article is the second...
“George Jackson: Black Revolutionary”
Editor's note The following article was written by Walter Rodney for a 1971 issue of Maji Maji, the quarterly journal of the youth wing of the Tanganyika African National Union. The text is held at the Robert W. Woodruff Library in Atlanta, Georgia, under the...
Walter Rodney: A people’s professor
Introduction In a recent book on the ongoing relevance of Walter Rodney’s work, Karim F. Hirji notes that, “as with scores of progressive intellectuals and activists of the past, the prevailing ideology functions to relegate Rodney into the deepest, almost...