Long before Rosa Parks became famous for resisting Jim Crow
來源:香港大書城megBookStore,http://www.megbook.com.hk laws, she was engaged in advocating for social justice for black
women who were the victims of sexual violence at the hands of white
men. Historian McGuire aims to rewrite the history of the civil
rights movement by highlighting sexual violence in the broader
context of racial injustice and the fight for freedom. Parks worked
as an investigator for the NAACP branch office in Montgomery,
Alabama, specializing in cases involving black women who had been
sexually assaulted by white men––cases that often went untried and
were the political opposite of the allegations of black men raping
white women ending in summary lynching with or without trials.
McGuire traces the history of several rape cases that triggered
vehement resistance by the NAACP and other groups, including the
1975 trial of Joan Little, who killed a white jailer who sexually
assaulted her. Despite the long tradition of dismissing charges
brought by blacks against whites, several of the cases ended in
convictions, as black women asserted their right to be treated
justly. --Vanessa Bush