The "White Devil" And Black Supremacy Myth in Islamic Teaching and Communication in the 1950s and 1960s in the United States

Abstract

During the 1950s and 1960s in America, there emerged out of the steelworks of race relations several black activist groups of steel fighting for civil rights through direct vigorous actions. Among these groups the Nation of Islam (NOI) stood out because of its new religious, economic and political philosophy. The NOI was born in 1930 to teach and spread Islam across the United States of America (USA). With Elijah Muhammad at its head, the NOI taught its newly converted black Muslims to love themselves, to accept with pride their identity as Blacks, to respect themselves and to uplift themselves by avoiding all illicit and immoral things forbidden by Islam. When the NOI attempted to convert the wrongs overwhelming the African American community into right, the news media started harassing it, propagandizing against it and misrepresenting it. The NOI got bogged down in a doctrine it kept fostering through the passionate and incendiary speeches of Malcolm X, one of its most charismatic leaders. This study investigates the trajectory that led to that doctrine and debunks the two myths about “white devils” and black supremacy that had surrounded it.