danielle mcguire at the dark end of the street

In 1944, Recy Taylor, a 24-year-old woman, married, with a young daughter, was kidnapped while walking home from church.

And many people may be aware that one of the early roles of Rosa Parks as the secretary of the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP was to investigate cases of rape as terrorism. Many people know Rosa Park’s work for the NAACP in the 1940s and 50s before the Montgomery Bus Boycott. And yet analyses of rape and sexualized violence play little or no role in most histories of the civil rights movement…” Civil rights campaigns in Little Rock, Arkansas Macon, Georgia Tallahassee, Florida Washington, North Carolina Birmingham and Selma, Alabama Hattiesburg, Mississippi and many other places had roots in organized resistance to sexual violence and appeals for protection of black womanhood. “Between 19, sexual violence and interracial rape became one crucial battleground upon which African Americans sought to destroy white supremacy and gain personal and political autonomy. The broad thesis is that the civil rights movement has suppressed or at least under-appreciated the role of women organizing against sexual violence. But as I continue to interact with people about race and historical issues, I am convinced that these difficult topics have to be discussed because the lack of discussion is part of what whitewashes history.Īt the Dark End of the Street is a reworking of Danielle McGuire’s dissertation. It is not described luridly, but in discussing the reality of the use of rape as a form of terrorism and an expression of white supremacy (in the sense of racial superiority), sexual violence is described regularly throughout the book. However, taking the concept of trigger warnings seriously, this is a book that discusses sexual violence and rape frequently. I have owned At the Dark End of the Street for years, and I have not picked it up because I knew that it would be a difficult book to read. Summary: Even in civil rights history, the role of women, especially their work to end sexualized violence, has been under-appreciated.

Danielle mcguire at the dark end of the street