But black folks have never really been optimists. We've been prisoners of hope, and hope is qualitatively different from optimism in the… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
We're talking about a prison-industrial complex. We're talking about a war on drugs that's generating unprecedented levels of incarcerated folk. We're talking… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
There's no doubt that many of the mainstream white institutions tend to be cosmetic and symbolic when it comes to including African-Americans,… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
When ordinary people wake up, elites begin to tremble in their boots. They can't get away with their abuse. They can't get… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
Christians got a lot of work to do. But, the spirit of Dorothy Day is alive. Martin Luther King is still alive.… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
Too many young folk have addiction to superficial things and not enough conviction for substantial things like justice, truth and love. — Cornel West Copy Share Image
I'm black, so, you know, I'm again with black folk, but it's a love that spills over to vanilla suburbs and red… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
If the churches don't move, much of the community won't move. We've got a situation in which a black church is still… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
It's true that you might be socially isolated because you're reading in the library, at home and so on, but you're intensely… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
So more and more black folk tend to be well-adjusted to [Barack] Obama's presidency, but does that mean they're well-adjusted to injustice?… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
I love my gay brothers. I love my lesbian sisters. I love my transvestite, my gender-bending folk. For me, it's a matter… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
There has certainly been ugly, right-wing hatred targeting Barack Obama. — Cornel West Copy Share Image
What is accurately portrayed is the rich humanity not just of Martin Luther King but of the movement, which was a multiracial movement. You… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
I feel as if I have been blessed to undergo a transformation from 'gangster' to 'redeemed sinner with gangster proclivities.' — Cornel West Copy Share Image
“Like King, we need to put on our cemetery clothes and be coffin-ready for the next great democratic battle.” — Cornel West Copy Share Image
“You can't really move forward until you look back. [From Remaking America panel discussion at George Washington University]” — Cornel West Copy Share Image
When we think of globalization we are thinking in part of structures and institutions that have been developed over time and that have allowed… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
The challenge artists face today is whether to be an underground, unheard genius, or to dilute their art for the marketplace. — Cornel West Copy Share Image
The need of black conservatives to gain the respect of their white peers deeply shapes certain elements of their conservatism. In this regard, they… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
For me, musicians are poets. Beethoven describes himself as a poet of tones, just like Coltrane's a poet of tempo. — Cornel West Copy Share Image
I don't draw any distinctions between forms of bigotry or forms of ideology that lose sight of the humanity of people. I can't stand… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
Barack Obama has domesticated the left in such a way that we feel as if we have no alternative but him...I refuse to accept… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
Larry Summers, I think, he had a long history of arrogance and relative ignorance about poor people's culture and working people's culture and so… — Cornel West Copy Share Image
