--- title: "3 Black community Quotes By Stephen M. Ward" description: "3 Black community quotes by Stephen M. Ward. Plus more from Stephen M. Ward and more Black community sayings from other authors." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/282/stephen-m-ward-26459_american-woman_as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black_1535320.jpg" --- > [“As an Asian American woman within black radical circles, Grace surely was anomalous, but this raised no significant concerns or barriers to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black-radical-circles-grace-surely/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/282/stephen-m-ward-26459_american-woman_as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black_1535320.jpg) > [“Grace regarded her participation in the March on Washington Movement (MOWM) in Chicago as “the turning point in my life” because, as…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/grace-regarded-her-participation-in-the-march-on-washington-movement/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/8a3/stephen-m-ward-26459_black-community_grace-regarded-her-participation-in-the_1911574.jpg) > [“BY MOST MEASURES, James and Grace Lee Boggs made an unlikely pair. Born in 1915 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Chinese immigrants,…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/by-most-measures-james-and-grace-lee-boggs-made-an-unlikely-pair-born/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) [Image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/141/stephen-m-ward-26459_american-woman_by-most-measures-james-and-grace-lee-bog_2134433.jpg) ## Other authors on Black community - [ ![](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wp-content/uploads/sms4s/authors/processed/b004/author-angela-davis-13301.jpg) Angela Davis 5 quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/black-community/angela-davis/) ## More by Stephen M. Ward > [“Grace deeply identified with Mead’s view that ideas evolve historically. “Unlike the average American teacher of philosophy of his day,” she wrote, Mead “urged…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/grace-deeply-identified-with-mead-s-view-that-ideas-evolve/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“Initially, she responded by turning inward, pondering questions about the meaning of life and her place in the world. This led her to the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/initially-she-responded-by-turning-inward-pondering-questions-about/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“In “Detroit Is Dynamite,” an August 1942 Life magazine article, Louis Martin and Ted Poston reported that 98.7 percent of all dwelling units in…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/in-detroit-is-dynamite-an-august-1942-life-magazine-article-louis/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“Jimmy and Grace returned to Detroit in late August, in time to participate in the final work to relaunch Correspondence. On September 21–22 the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/jimmy-and-grace-returned-to-detroit-in-late-august-in-time-to/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“Thirteen million Negroes in America have never known three of the “Four Freedoms” which America is supposedly spreading to the rest of the world.…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/thirteen-million-negroes-in-america-have-never-known-three-of-the/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“What are you complaining about? If they don’t want you over here, why don’t you go over on Hastings Street and get yourself something?”…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/what-are-you-complaining-about-if-they-don-t-want-you-over-here-why/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“Jimmy likely wrote all three editorials, and one, titled “Who Is for Law and Order?” carried his byline. He argued that the spectacle, seen…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/jimmy-likely-wrote-all-three-editorials-and-one-titled-who-is-for-law/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“She told him the origins of the “buck dance,” when “white people would come up and say ‘N\_\_\_\_r, dance’, and then start shooting around…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/she-told-him-the-origins-of-the-buck-dance-when-white-people-would/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“As a Chinese American growing up in a largely white world during the 1920s and 1930s, a sense of social marginalization marked her formative…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/as-a-chinese-american-growing-up-in-a-largely-white-world-during-the/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“Grace Lee Boggs was both product and producer of an improbable history. “I grew up in New York as a first generation Chinese American…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/grace-lee-boggs-was-both-product-and-producer-of-an-improbable/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“As an Asian American woman within black radical circles, Grace surely was anomalous, but this raised no significant concerns or barriers to her participation…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black-radical-circles-grace-surely/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“Under Weiss’s direction, Grace began to delve deeply into writings and ideas that would shape the rest of her life. To begin with, Weiss…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/under-weiss-s-direction-grace-began-to-delve-deeply-into-writings-and/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“They listened to a series of speeches by civil rights luminaries, capped off by a rousing, crowd-pleasing address by Martin Luther King. While the…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/they-listened-to-a-series-of-speeches-by-civil-rights-luminaries/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“public statements condemning segregation, sharply worded telegrams to Washington, and meetings with White House officials—were demonstrably ineffectual. New and more dramatic measures were in…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/public-statements-condemning-segregation-sharply-worded-telegrams-to/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) > [“Grace regarded her participation in the March on Washington Movement (MOWM) in Chicago as “the turning point in my life” because, as she told…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/grace-regarded-her-participation-in-the-march-on-washington-movement/) [Stephen M. Ward](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/stephen-m-ward/) ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "ItemList", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/about/black-community/stephen-m-ward/#itemlist", "name": "3 Black community Quotes By Stephen M. Ward", "numberOfItems": 3, "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“As an Asian American woman within black radical circles, Grace surely was anomalous, but this raised no significant concerns or barriers to her participation in various black organizations, struggles, and movements. While she never attempted to conceal her ethnic identity, Grace developed a political identity as a black movement activist—that is, an activist based in a black community and operating within black movements. Living with Jimmy in a black community in the 1950s and immersing herself in the social and political worlds of black Detroit, she solidified this political identity through her activism. By the early 1960s she was firmly situated within a network of activists building organizations, staging protests, and engaging in a range of grassroots political initiatives. By mid-decade, when the Black Power movement emerged, Grace was a fixture within black radical politics in Detroit and widely known in movement circles nationally. Together, Jimmy and Grace helped to build a vibrant local black protest community in Detroit, the city that served not only as their home and political base, but also as a catalyst for new ideas about social change. They formulated their theories through grassroots activism in the context of—and at times directly in response to—the tremendous urban transformation experienced by the Motor City during the decades following World War II. Alongside their local efforts, the couple forged an ever-widening network of activists, artists, and intellectuals across the country, engaging multiple spaces of black activist politics. A diverse group of younger black activists from Detroit and across the country visited their eastside Detroit home—“ the Boggses’ University,” as one of them labeled it. 2 Each received theoretical training, political education, and a sense of historical continuity between past and future struggles. Through their extraordinary partnership James and Grace Lee Boggs built several organizations, undertook innumerable local activist initiatives, produced an array of theoretical and political writings, and mentored a generation of activists.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Stephen M. Ward" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black-radical-circles-grace-surely/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/282/stephen-m-ward-26459_american-woman_as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black_1535320.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/282/stephen-m-ward-26459_american-woman_as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black_1535320.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/282/stephen-m-ward-26459_american-woman_as-an-asian-american-woman-within-black_1535320.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“As an Asian American woman within black radical circles, Grace surely was anomalous, but this raised no…” — Stephen M. Ward", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“Grace regarded her participation in the March on Washington Movement (MOWM) in Chicago as “the turning point in my life” because, as she told Horace Cayton years later, she had come to Chicago searching for the basis of a “new civilization” and found it “in the Negroes mobilizing themselves for the March on Washington. I shall never forget the transformation that took place in them with the call for the march.” 17 As a young, emerging radical, the sense of political possibility embodied in the MOWM made a considerable impression on her thinking. Specifically, it gave her a workable model and clear vision of a mass movement. Furthermore, it gave her an appreciation for the potential of grassroots politics not only to confront social injustice but also to effect individual and community transformation. Finally, the MOWM cemented Grace’s commitment to black political struggle. “The March on Washington changed my life,” she wrote more than half a century later. It “taught me lessons that have shaped my activities ever since.” One of these lessons was “that a movement begins when large numbers of people, having reached the point where they feel they can’t take the way things are any longer, find hope for improving their daily lives in an action that they can take together.” Even more important for her own political trajectory, she “also discovered the power that the black community has within itself to change this country when it begins to move. As a result, I decided that what I wanted to do with the rest of my life was to become a movement activist in the black community.” 18”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Stephen M. Ward" }, "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/stephen-m-ward/grace-regarded-her-participation-in-the-march-on-washington-movement/", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/8a3/stephen-m-ward-26459_black-community_grace-regarded-her-participation-in-the_1911574.jpg", "contentUrl": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/8a3/stephen-m-ward-26459_black-community_grace-regarded-her-participation-in-the_1911574.jpg", "url": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/8a3/stephen-m-ward-26459_black-community_grace-regarded-her-participation-in-the_1911574.jpg", "width": 1080, "height": 1080, "caption": "“Grace regarded her participation in the March on Washington Movement (MOWM) in Chicago as “the turning point…” — Stephen M. Ward", "creditText": "SMS4Smile Quotes", "creator": { "@id": "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/#organization" } } } }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "item": { "@type": "Quotation", "text": "“BY MOST MEASURES, James and Grace Lee Boggs made an unlikely pair. Born in 1915 in Providence, Rhode Island, to Chinese immigrants, Grace Chin Lee was raised in New York City and earned a Ph.D. in philosophy from Bryn Mawr College at the age of twenty-five. With dim prospects in academia as a Chinese American woman, she moved to Chicago, where she came of age politically by living in the black community and entering left-wing politics. James “Jimmy” Boggs was born in Marion Junction, Alabama, in 1919 and migrated to Detroit in search of employment in the auto industry following his high school graduation in 1937. In 1940, the year that Grace earned a Ph.D., Jimmy landed a job in a Chrysler auto plant, beginning a twenty-eight-year career as an autoworker and member of the United Auto Workers (UAW). Out of these divergent personal backgrounds and social experiences, Grace and Jimmy fashioned a unique brand of black radical politics by the early 1960s.”", "creator": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Stephen M. 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