Fannie Lou Hamer and the meaning of freedom

Vox's Jamil Smith talks with Keisha Blain, associate professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh and author of Until I Am Free: Fannie Lou Hamer's Enduring Message to America. They discuss the legacy of Fannie Lou Hamer, a sharecropper-turned-civil-rights-activist, whose speech about voting rights at the 1964 Democratic National Convention changed how the Democratic Party viewed Black activism. They talk about how Hamer's ideas influence movements for human rights and racial equity today.

Host: Jamil Smith (@JamilSmith), Senior Correspondent, Vox

Guest: Keisha Blain (@KeishaBlain), author; professor of history, University of Pittsburgh

References: 

• Until I Am Free: Fannie Lou Hamer's Enduring Message to America by Keisha Blain (Beacon Press; 2021)
• Fannie Lou Hamer's speech at the DNC (August 22, 1964)
• American Experience: Freedom Summer (dir. Stanley Nelson. PBS; 2014)

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This episode was made by: 

• Producer: Erikk Geannikis
• Editor: Amy Drozdowska
• Engineer: Paul Robert Mounsey
• Deputy Editorial Director, Vox Talk: Amber Hall

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