For excluded African Americans, the church became the chief arena of black public life

Evidence

For African Americans, long excluded from political institutions and denied presence, even relevance, in the dominant society’s myths about its heritage and national community, the church itself became the domain for the expression, celebration, and pursuit of a black collective will and identity. At issue here is the public dimension of the black church, not the religious dimension of the public realm. The question is not how religious symbols and values were promoted in American politics, but how public space, both physical and discursive, was interpolated within black religious institutions. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 71

Categorization

• DEFINE: Introduces the core framing: black church as public space, not as religion entering politics.
• XREF: connects to: Black Baptists were the largest black institution countering American racial exclusion. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 57; Black churches historically functioned as multipurpose civic institutions — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 798; The black church substituted for every barred public accommodation in segregated America — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 62 (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• The black church functioned as an oppositional counter-public sphere to white society #corroborates (0.88) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 78
• The Black church physically housed the civil rights movement’s organizing #exemplifies (0.85) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 1043
• Black churches served as the organizing infrastructure for political resistance #exemplifies (0.85) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 1031
• The Black church simultaneously advances liberation and conserves piety that undermines it #complicates (0.83) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 1058
• The black church was a counterpublic that both opposed and internalized white norms #qualifies (0.82) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 84
• Black institutions arose because white supremacy excluded blacks from civic life #expands (0.80) — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 342
• Spiritual salvation and political racial advancement were fused in black church tradition #expands (0.78) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 565
• The Social Gospel also flourished within black churches #expands (0.75) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 796