We Testify with Our Lives: How Religion Transformed Radical Thought from Black Power to Black Lives Matter

Police killings of unarmed Black people have ignited a national and international response, drawing on a Black radical tradition that contests liberalism's abstract understanding of democracy. Terrence L. Johnson's book "We Testify with Our Lives" reconstructs a radical lived ethics of freedom and justice, calling for new embodied frameworks to achieve human flourishing and dignity. Black bodies represent the primary form of resistance against violent and oppressive regimes, and the individual and collective struggles of Black life bear witness to the determination to cultivate beauty, rage, and joy.

\n Format: Paperback / softback
\n Length: 312 pages
\n Publication date: 17 August 2021
\n Publisher: Columbia University Press
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Police killings of unarmed Black people have sparked a nationwide and international response unlike any in decades. However, today's activists differ from their civil rights-oriented predecessors in their belief that the institutions and values of liberal democracy cannot eradicate structural racism. Instead, they draw on a Black radical tradition that, as Terrence L. Johnson argues, derives its force from its unacknowledged ethical and religious dimensions.

We Testify with Our Lives explores the enduring influence of Black religions from the SNCC to the present, reconstructing a radical lived ethics of freedom and justice. Johnson demonstrates that Black Power fundamentally challenges liberalism's abstract understanding of democracy, calling for new embodied frameworks to achieve human flourishing and dignity. Black bodies serve as the primary form of resistance against violent and oppressive regimes of white supremacy and exploitation, and the individual and collective struggles of Black life bear witness to the unwavering determination to cultivate beauty, rage, and joy.

Drawing upon the writings of Audre Lorde, Toni Cade Bambara, Stokely Carmichael, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and James Baldwin, We Testify with Our Lives presents a new narrative of the evolution of Black radicalism from the civil rights movement to the Movement for Black Lives. It offers fresh insights into Black Power's vital contributions to debates on ethics, transnational politics, democracy, political solidarity, and freedom, and its powerful resources for the ongoing struggle to build democratic possibilities for all.

\n Weight: 374g\n
Dimension: 174 x 383 x 18 (mm)\n
ISBN-13: 9780231200455\n \n