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William Edward Burghardt Du Bois ( / djuːˈbɔɪs / dew-BOYSS; [1] [2] February 23, 1868 – August 27, 1963) was an American sociologist, socialist, historian, and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist . Born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, Du Bois grew up in a relatively tolerant and integrated community.
- William Edward Burghardt Du Bois, February 23, 1868, Great Barrington, Massachusetts, U.S.
- August 27, 1963 (aged 95), Accra, Ghana
- 2, including Yolande
- Overview
- The Souls of Black Folk, the Niagara Movement, and the NAACP
- Black nationalism and later works
W.E.B. Du Bois was an American sociologist, historian, author, editor, and activist who was the most important Black protest leader in the United States during the first half of the 20th century. He shared in the creation of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909.
What did W.E.B. Du Bois write?
W.E.B. Du Bois’s notable works include The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study (1899), the first case study of a Black community in the United States; a collection of essays, The Souls of Black Folk (1903), a landmark of African American literature; Black Reconstruction (1935); and the autobiography Dusk of Dawn (1940).
Where was W.E.B. Du Bois educated?
W.E.B. Du Bois graduated from Fisk University, a historically Black institution in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1888. He received a Ph.D. in history from Harvard University in 1895.
How was W.E.B. Du Bois influential?
Du Bois graduated from Fisk University, a historically Black institution in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1888. He received a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1895. His doctoral dissertation, The Suppression of the African Slave-Trade to the United States of America, 1638–1870, was published in 1896. Although Du Bois took an advanced degree in history, he was broadly trained in the social sciences; and, at a time when sociologists were theorizing about race relations, he was conducting empirical inquiries into the condition of Blacks. For more than a decade he devoted himself to sociological investigations of Blacks in America, producing 16 research monographs published between 1897 and 1914 at Atlanta University in Georgia, where he was a professor, as well as The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study (1899), the first case study of a Black community in the United States.
(Read Henry Louis Gates, Jr.’s Britannica essay on “Monuments of Hope.”)
Although Du Bois had originally believed that social science could provide the knowledge to solve the race problem, he gradually came to the conclusion that in a climate of virulent racism, expressed in such evils as lynching, peonage, disfranchisement, Jim Crow segregation laws, and race riots, social change could be accomplished only through agitation and protest. In this view, he clashed with the most influential Black leader of the period, Booker T. Washington, who, preaching a philosophy of accommodation, urged Blacks to accept discrimination for the time being and elevate themselves through hard work and economic gain, thus winning the respect of whites. In 1903, in his famous book The Souls of Black Folk, Du Bois charged that Washington’s strategy, rather than freeing the Black man from oppression, would serve only to perpetuate it. This attack crystallized the opposition to Booker T. Washington among many Black intellectuals, polarizing the leaders of the Black community into two wings—the “conservative” supporters of Washington and his “radical” critics.
Two years later, in 1905, Du Bois took the lead in founding the Niagara Movement, which was dedicated chiefly to attacking the platform of Booker T. Washington. The small organization, which met annually until 1909, was seriously weakened by internal squabbles and Washington’s opposition. But it was significant as an ideological forerunner and direct inspiration for the interracial NAACP, founded in 1909. Du Bois played a prominent part in the creation of the NAACP and became the association’s director of research and editor of its magazine, The Crisis. In this role he wielded an unequaled influence among middle-class Blacks and progressive whites as the propagandist for the Black protest from 1910 until 1934.
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Du Bois’s Black nationalism took several forms—the most influential being his pioneering advocacy of Pan-Africanism, the belief that all people of African descent had common interests and should work together in the struggle for their freedom. Du Bois was a leader of the first Pan-African Conference in London in 1900 and the architect of four Pan-African Congresses held between 1919 and 1927. Second, he articulated a cultural nationalism. As the editor of The Crisis, he encouraged the development of Black literature and art and urged his readers to see “Beauty in Black.” Third, Du Bois’s Black nationalism is seen in his belief that Blacks should develop a separate “group economy” of producers’ and consumers’ cooperatives as a weapon for fighting economic discrimination and Black poverty. This doctrine became especially important during the economic catastrophe of the 1930s and precipitated an ideological struggle within the NAACP.
He resigned from the editorship of The Crisis and the NAACP in 1934, yielding his influence as a race leader and charging that the organization was dedicated to the interests of the Black bourgeoisie and ignored the problems of the masses. Du Bois’s interest in cooperatives was a part of his nationalism that developed out of his Marxist leanings. At the turn of the century, he had been an advocate of Black capitalism and Black support of Black business, but by about 1905 he had been drawn toward socialist doctrines. Although he joined the Socialist Party only briefly in 1912, he remained sympathetic with Marxist ideas throughout the rest of his life.
Upon leaving the NAACP, he returned to Atlanta University, where he devoted the next 10 years to teaching and scholarship. In 1940 he founded the magazine Phylon, Atlanta University’s “Review of Race and Culture.” In 1945 he published the “Preparatory Volume” of a projected Encyclopedia Africana, for which he had been appointed editor in chief and toward which he had been working for decades. He also produced two major books during this period. Black Reconstruction: An Essay Toward a History of the Part Which Black Folk Played in the Attempt to Reconstruct Democracy in America, 1860–1880 (1935) was an important Marxist interpretation of Reconstruction (the period following the American Civil War during which the seceded Southern states were reorganized according to the wishes of Congress), and, more significantly, it provided the first synthesis of existing knowledge of the role of Blacks in that critical period of American history. In 1940 appeared Dusk of Dawn, subtitled An Essay Toward an Autobiography of a Race Concept. In this brilliant book, Du Bois explained his role in both the African and the African American struggles for freedom, viewing his career as an ideological case study illuminating the complexity of the Black-white conflict.
Following this fruitful decade at Atlanta University, he returned once more to a research position at the NAACP (1944–48). This brief connection ended in a second bitter quarrel, and thereafter Du Bois moved steadily leftward politically. Identified with pro-Russian causes, he was indicted in 1951 as an unregistered agent for a foreign power. Although a federal judge directed his acquittal, Du Bois had become completely disillusioned with the United States. In 1961 he applied to, and was accepted as a member of, the Communist Party. That same year he left the United States for Ghana, where he began work on the Encyclopedia Africana in earnest, though it would never be completed, and where he later became a citizen.
- Elliott Rudwick
Oct 27, 2009 · W.E.B. Du Bois was an African American writer, teacher, sociologist and activist who transformed the way that the lives of Black citizens were seen in American society. He was an early champion of using data to solve social issues for the Black community, and his writing—including his groundbreaking The Souls of Black Folk —became required reading in African American studies. He also led the Niagara Movement and the NAACP, and was a progressive and left-wing activist.
Apr 3, 2014 · W.E.B. Du Bois was an influential African American rights activist and scholar who co-founded the NAACP and wrote 'The Souls of Black Folk.' He was the first African American to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard University and a proponent of Pan-Africanism. Learn more about his life, education, writing, activism, and legacy.
Learn about the life and legacy of W.E.B. Du Bois, the first Black American to earn a PhD from Harvard and a leading thinker on race and the plight of Black Americans. He was also a founding member of NAACP, editor of its journal, and a global citizen who advocated for social justice and Pan-Africanism.
Sep 13, 2017 · W.E.B. Du Bois. First published Wed Sep 13, 2017; substantive revision Wed Dec 20, 2023. William Edward Burghardt Du Bois (1868–1963) believed that his life acquired its only deep significance through its participation in what he called “the Negro problem,” or, later, “the race problem.”.
A comprehensive biography of W. E. B. Du Bois, a scholar, writer, editor, and civil rights pioneer who made a close study of his family origins, weaving them rhetorically and conceptually into almost everything he wrote. Learn about his life, education, research, and political activism in the context of the African American community and the larger society.
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