
A Chance for Change
Head Start and Mississippi's Black Freedom Struggle
Crystal R. Sanders(Author)
The University of North Carolina Press
Published on 18. April 2016
Book
Paperback/Softback
240 pages
978-1-4696-2780-9 (ISBN)
Description
In this innovative study, Crystal Sanders explores how working-class black women, in collaboration with the federal government, created the Child Development Group of Mississippi (CDGM) in 1965, a Head Start program that not only gave poor black children access to early childhood education but also provided black women with greater opportunities for political activism during a crucial time in the unfolding of the civil rights movement. Women who had previously worked as domestics and sharecroppers secured jobs through CDGM as teachers and support staff and earned higher wages. The availability of jobs independent of the local white power structure afforded these women the freedom to vote in elections and petition officials without fear of reprisal. But CDGM's success antagonized segregationists at both the local and state levels who eventually defunded it.
Tracing the stories of the more than 2,500 women who staffed Mississippi's CDGM preschool centers, Sanders's book remembers women who went beyond teaching children their shapes and colors to challenge the state's closed political system and white supremacist ideology and offers a profound example for future community organizing in the South.
Tracing the stories of the more than 2,500 women who staffed Mississippi's CDGM preschool centers, Sanders's book remembers women who went beyond teaching children their shapes and colors to challenge the state's closed political system and white supremacist ideology and offers a profound example for future community organizing in the South.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Chapel Hill
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
23 halftones, 1 tables
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 156 mm
Thickness: 16 mm
Weight
461 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-4696-2780-9 (9781469627809)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

E-Book
02/2016
The University of North Carolina Press
€19.49
Available for download
Person
Crystal R. Sanders is assistant professor of history and African American Studies at Pennsylvania State University, USA.