THIS IS REVOLUTION>podcast Ep. 171: What is the Revolutionary Capacity of the Black Church w/ Nikol Alexander Floyd

From the earliest period of Black American history the Black Church has had an integral role in shaping the social fabric of Black life. Throughout various periods of that long history the Black church has also been crucial in Black political action and institution building. In this current moment when Black electoral politics is rooted in the right wing corporate flank of the Democratic Party with many White progressives to the left, is there any potential for the Black church to be anything more than a vehicle of political and social control used by the Black political class? Is there potential for the Black church to be radicalized to embrace an agenda that fights the egregious nature of American capitalism and imperialism?
 
Do phenomena like prosperity ministries relegate the Black church to being a vehicle for promoting conspicuous consumption and Black capitalism, or is a more radical vision possible?
 
We will ask these questions and more on this episode of THIS IS REVOLUTION.

 
About Dr. Floyd:
Nikol G. Alexander-Floyd is Associate Professor Political Science at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. A lawyer and political scientist, Dr. Alexander-Floyd has been actively engaged in a wide range of political and legal issues. Dr. Alexander-Floyd has been a featured speaker at fora and symposia at a number of colleges and universities, including Bryn Mawr College, CUNY Graduate Center, Northwestern University, Prairieview A&M University, Princeton University, and Syracuse University, among others. A strong advocate for minorities in general and women of color in particular, she co-founded the Association for the Study of Black Women in Politics (www.asbwp.org), an organization dedicated to promoting the development of Black women’s and gender studies and supporting the professionalization of Black women political scientists. As a legal theorist and activist, she has produced scholarship and provided commentary on some of the cutting edge legal cases of our time, including the important Hopwood case in Texas; her involvement and leadership around Hopwood led to guest appearances and interviews on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” and National Public Radio.

 
An award-winning educator, she teaches a range of courses on Black feminist theory, Black women’s political activism, and race, gender, media, and the law. Dr. Alexander-Floyd is the author of Gender, Race, and Nationalism in Contemporary Black Politics (Palgrave Macmillan 2007), and her articles have appeared in leading journals such as Feminist Formations, The International Journal of Africana Studies, Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies, Meridians: Feminism, Race, Transnationalism, The National Political Science Review, Politics & Gender, PS: Political Science & Politics, and Signs. She is a past Co-Chair of the Annual Meeting of the National Women's Studies Association, and past Chair of the American Political Science Association's Committee on the Status of Women and the Profession. Her latest book, Liminal Subjects: Black Women, Melodrama, and Post-Feminism in the New Millennium (forthcoming NYU Press, 2020), investigates the political implications of post-feminist, post-civil rights ideology.

 
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