New Books Network Kenja McCray, "Essential Soldiers: Women Activists and Black Power Movement Leadership" (NYU Press, 2025)
Sep 22, 2025
Kenja McCray, an Assistant Professor of History at Clayton State University and author of Essential Soldiers, dives into the essential roles women played in the Black Power movement. She challenges the notion of a male-dominated movement by highlighting women's unique leadership styles through service and collaboration. McCray discusses her innovative research methods, including oral histories and archival work, to reveal how grassroots activism was shaped by female figures. Her insights shed light on the underrepresented narratives of African American women activists who transformed their communities.
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Women Reframe Black Power Leadership
- Kenja McCray reframes Black Power by centering women’s sustained, management, and service work.
- She argues this work produced a distinctive, people-centered form of leadership often overlooked.
Personal Path From Spelman To Research
- McCray recalls how Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me inspired her to study women’s experiences in Black activist spaces.
- She connects her Spelman College journey and Osset sisterhood to earlier formulations of African womanhood by 1960s activists.
What Kawaida Means And Why It Matters
- Kawaida is an African-centered philosophy developed by Ron Karenga that informed cultural nationalist groups and Kwanzaa.
- Cultural nationalists used Kiswahili and African-derived aesthetics to build diasporic solidarity distinct from Panther-style revolutionary nationalism.
