Resumen de Empowering communities: Ella Baker ’ s decentralized leadership style and conversational eloquence
This article examines Ella Baker ’ s distinctive contributions to what she called the fight for full freedom. In particular, this article analyzes Baker ’ s 1969 speech, “ The Black Woman in the Civil Rights Struggle.
” This article con- tends that Baker ’ s rhetorical efforts allowed her to revitalize and rethink the Civil Rights Movement by positioning her audience as its leaders. By empowering her audience to be leaders and to take a personal stake in the fight for freedom, Baker promoted the continuation of the Civil Rights Movement by emphasizing the importance of individual action and the commitment to a larger communal struggle. This article enriches scholar- ship about the Civil Rights Movement, by highlighting how Civil Rights Movement rhetors used a wide array of appeals.
