Respectability politics mobilized working-class blacks toward racial self-help

Evidence

On the one hand the politics of respectability rallied poor workingclass blacks to the cause of racial self-help, by inspiring them to save, sacrifice, and pool their scant resources for the support of black-owned institutions. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 94

Categorization

• DEFINE: Begins unpacking the mechanism of respectability politics — its rallying function for poor blacks toward self-help through moral appeals.
• XREF: connects to: Racial self-help thrived amid disfranchisement, segregation, and pervasive violence. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 422; Black self-help movements actively inculcated mainstream bourgeois values into the poor — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 454; The black church served as the primary autonomous arena for racial self-help after Reconstruction. — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent: The Women’s…, 52 (+8 more)

Broader Connections

• Respectability politics served as a foundation for overt black political action #expands (0.85) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 1031
• The respectability campaign rhetorically elevated working-class domestic servants as race exemplars #exemplifies (0.80) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 997
• Black church women were central to the church’s public role as racial self-help #corroborates (0.80) — Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Righteous Discontent, 37
• Respectability politics can both empower and imprison a marginalized group #qualifies (0.75) — Nikole Hannah-Jones et al., The 1619 Project, 1128