The Revolution Will Be Streamed: Black Communists in Exile
Start: 2021-02-21 19:00:00 UTC Eastern Standard Time (US & Canada) (GMT-05:00)
End: 2021-02-21 21:30:00 UTC Eastern Standard Time (US & Canada) (GMT-05:00)
This is a virtual event
In 2021, DSA Emerge has committed to make the development of Marxist cadre a priority. Among other things, this means redoubling our commitment to political education. In that spirit, DSA Emerge screens and discusses films about the history of global Marxism in a series called The Revolution Will Be Streamed. This month we are screening an excerpt from "W.E.B. DuBois: A Biography in Four Voices" (1996) and ”Claudia Jones: a Woman of our Times” (1989).
This excerpt from a four-part documentary on W.E.B. DuBois takes up the political radicalism of the final years of his long life. Written by Amiri Baraka, the segment looks in depth at DuBois’s split from the NAACP during the Cold War; his McCarthyist trial and investigation by the FBI; the US government’s attempt to keep him from international travel, including the 1955 Bandung conference, through stripping him of his passport; his eventual travels to China and the USSR; his decision to join the CPUSA in 1961; and his final self-imposed exile in Kwame Nkrumah’s Ghana.
"Claudia Jones: A Woman of our Times" follows the life of Trinidadian communist Claudia Jones after she was deported to London because of McCarthyist anticommunism. Using the tools she learned organizing with Communist Party in Harlem, New York, Jones brought an incredible vitality to the political and cultural life of Notting Hill, the heart of Caribbean life in London. Her remarkable impact as an organizer and writer resulted in her being buried to the left of Karl Marx in Highgate Cemetery.
In screening these documentaries, Emerge invites our comrades to reflect on the US government’s war on Black communism: what threat did they believe it posed? Why did DuBois respond through internationalism, party membership and emigration? What lessons can we draw from how Claudia Jones combined culture and politics in the name of liberation? Join us to discuss these and other questions over Zoom after the screening!
RSVP to watch the films via livestream with us at 7PM on Sunday, February 21st and then join the discussion over Zoom, starting around 8:10PM immediately following the screening.
Unable to join us real-time for the stream? You can watch them on your own time here:
W.E.B. DuBois: A Biography in Four Voices - Part 4: "Color & Democracy: Colonies and Peace 1949-1963" the section we’ll be screening begins at the 1 hour 23 min mark, but feel free to watch the first three parts, if you want to!
