Zora Neale Hurston and the Brown Debate: Race, Class, and the Progressive Empire

Abstract

Abstract:The Orlando Sentinel published a 1955 letter to the editor from Zora Neale Hurston. In it, she condemns the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education and the leadership of the Black intelligentsia in the decision. Using Timothy Parsons’ myth of a progressive empire, this article emphasizes Hurston’s central thesis: that forced desegregation leads to spiritual and cultural oppression, disguised within the ostensibly progressive Brown. The analysis also examines Hurston’s class-straddling perspective in the construction of her argument and analyzes the role of class in the Brown strategy. Hurston’s argument, understood through the lens of progressive empire, has implications for current educators of Black students.