1960s/1970s
Umi's handwritten transcription of excerpts from two speeches by Malcolm X/El Hajj Malik El Shabazz. One at the London School of Economics on February 11, 1965 and the other at an Organization of Afro-American Unity rally in July 1964.
Notes: I imagine these transcriptions come from one of the older tapes with Malcolm's name scribbled on it in the collection. I imagine a young Umi with her tape recorder listening intentently and then stopping and starting to get his words down right. There is real intensity in my vision of what she is doing, trying to match the magnitude of what his words must have meant to her; for her not to be content with just listening to them, but needing to write them down as well.
“I say bluntly that you have had a generation of Africans who actually believed that you could negotiate, negotiate, negotiate & eventually get some kind of independence. But you're getting a new generation that has been growing, right now, & they're beginning to think with their own minds & see that you can't negotiate up on freedom nowadays. If something is yours by right, then fight for it or shut up. If you can't fight for it, then forget it.” — London School of Economics 1965
“I want to go back to Africa. But what can I do while I'm waiting to go? Go hungry? Live in a rat infested slum? Send my children to a school where their brains are being crippled? No, if we are going to go but time is going to pass between now and our going, then we have to get a long range program & a short range program, one that is [next page] designed to turn us in that direction, but at the same time, one that is designed to enable us to take maximum advantage of every opportunity under this roof where we are right now.”
Malcolm X July 1964