Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism

Cameron argues that, contrary to historical and popular depictions of African Americans as naturally religious, freethought has been central to black political and intellectual life from the nineteenth century to the present. Freethought encompasses many different schools of thought, including atheism, agnosticism, and nontraditional orientations such as deism and paganism. He suggests an alternative origin of nonbelief and religious skepticism in America, namely the brutality of the institution of slavery. He also traces the growth of atheism and agnosticism among African Americans in two major political and intellectual movements of the 1920s: the New Negro Renaissance and the growth of black socialism and communism. In a final chapter, he explores the critical importance of freethought among participants in the civil rights and Black Power movements of the 1960s and 1970s.

Our Presenters:

Chris Cameron is a history professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte with research and teaching interests in African American and early American history, including slavery, the antislavery movement, religious and intellectual history. His first book, was To Plead Our Own Cause: African Americans in Massachusetts and the Making of the Antislavery Movement where he explored the relationship between Puritan theology and the rise of black abolitionism, arguing throughout the work that African Americans were central to the development of the antislavery movement in America.

Debbie Goddard is American Atheists’ VP of Programs. She has over two decades of experience as an organizer and activist, including 15 years at the Center for Inquiry. Debbie led CFI's outreach campaigns and was director of African Americans for Humanism. Debbie also engages in LGBTQ activism, civil rights work, and training new organizers in her community. She facilitates workshops and gives presentations on campaign-building, evidence-based activism, diversity and outreach, group organizing, humanism and politics, and other topics.

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