Connecting Struggles for Liberation
Driving Question: How were local fights against injustice connected to global trends in decolonization?
The fight for justice didn’t stop with independence. See how civil rights and anti-apartheid movements challenged racism, inequality, and oppression while drawing strength from global connections.
Learning Objectives:
- Use close-reading skills to analyze how liberation movements were connected to decolonization.
- Create arguments using historical evidence to support claims and communicate conclusions through informal writing.
Vocab Terms:
- apartheid
- coup
- decolonization
- ideological
- intervention
- protest
- superpower
These song lyrics will help you consider the causes of the Civil Rights movement in the United States and to begin thinking about its global connections.
After they watch the video and read the article, have students complete the Soundtrack for Liberation activity. Remind them of the concert honoring Nelson Mandela in 1990 and that music has often been a powerful tool of disenfranchised groups.
Note: Your students might have trouble coming up with song titles, so feel free to help them brainstorm. Here are a few ideas from us (if you want to look cool in front of your students):
- Sam Cooke: “A Change Is Gonna Come”
- Nina Simone: “Mississippi Goddam”
- Billie Holiday: “Strange Fruit”
- Bob Marley and the Wailers: “Get Up, Stand Up”
- Alpha Blondy: “Apartheid Is Nazism”
- Víctor Jara: “El Derecho de Vivir en Paz”
- The Cranberries: “Zombie”
- The Dubliners: “The Foggy Dew”
- Childish Gambino: “This Is America”
- Woody Guthrie: “This Land Is Your Land”
- Woody Guthrie: “Tear the Fascists Down”
- Aretha Franklin: “Respect”
- H.E.R.: “I Can’t Breathe”
- Bella Ciao: Traditional Italian partisan song
Looking for a complement to these apartheid materials? In the Community post “The Mandela Effect from NPR’s Throughline” you’ll learn about a great audio resource.
Use this article and video to examine how struggles for racial justice in the United States and South Africa were part of larger global movements for freedom.
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Guiding Questions
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Before you watch
Preview the questions below, and then review the transcript.
While you watch
Look for answers to these questions:
- What was the purpose of the Wembley Stadium concert in London?
- What was apartheid and why did it start?
- How was Nigeria connected to South Africa?
- How did people in other countries support the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa?
After you watch
Respond to this question: What sort of resistance or protest do you think was most important in pressuring the South African government into ending apartheid?
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Guiding Questions
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Before you read
Preview the questions below, and then skim the article. Be sure to look at the section headings and any images.
While you read
Look for answers to these questions:
- What was the Double-V campaign?
- How did Hitler use racism in the United States to support his arguments?
- How did anticolonial leaders influence the US civil rights movement?
- Why did civil rights activism create a problem for US foreign policy during the Cold War?
- What role did international events play in shaping civil rights efforts in the United States?
After you read
Respond to this question: How does this article support or challenge the idea that civil rights movements were part of global struggles linked to the Cold War and decolonization?
Use this informal writing opportunity to reflect on how local and global struggles for justice were connected and what those connections reveal about the world today.
Land reform, resistance against authoritarian rule, Cold War influences, decolonization, and the fight for democracy all came together in Latin America.
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Guiding Questions
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Before you read
Preview the questions below, and then skim the article. Be sure to look at the section headings and any images.
While you read
Look for answers to these questions:
- In what way is Latin American history like a pendulum?
- How did Latin American politics shift to the left before World War II?
- What changes occurred after World War II that made politics more radical?
- How did neoliberalism affect Latin America?
- How did global and local forces shape these shifts?
After you read
Respond to these questions: Do the changes in modern Latin America covered in this article feel more like revolutions or cycles of change? Why?
