The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks

Fred Gray represented five defendants in Browder v. Gayle, which declared the discriminatory bus laws of Montgomery, Alabama, unconstitutional. The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that the laws were unconstitutional, an important victory for the civil rights movement, but Parks felt this landmark case was inadequate. The decision led to an increase in violence in the city, including church bombings and threats against King and Parks, that helped prompt the Parks family’s decision to move to Detroit.

Brown v. Board of Education refers to the 1954 Supreme Court trial. The Supreme Court ruled that “separate but equal” was not constitutional as it applied to public city schools. Parks attended a two-week program at the Highlander Folk School on a scholarship to find ways to enforce the Brown v. Board of Education ruling, at a time when she was feeling defeated in her work as an activist. The racially integrated experiences and positive environment at the school energized and renewed her activist zeal and helped prompt her refusal to give up her seat on the bus the year after this ruling.

Dissemblance is described in the book as a type of silence of Black women as a means of coping with sexual and political violence. This strategy reflects the training Parks was given as a child to convince white people that she was content and avoid provoking them or attracting negative attention. Although Parks was a strong woman of profound activism, Theoharis shows many ways in which she refused to defend herself against the one-dimensional media image created for her or to speak out against the racist and gendered structures that rooted her in a role of domestic symbolism despite her lifelong activism.

The Edmund Pettus Bridge was the site of a violent incident in Selma, Alabama, referred to as “Bloody Sunday.” On March 7, 1965, law enforcement officers took drastic and violent measures against peaceful, unarmed marchers on the bridge in response to Governor George Wallace’s instructions to end the demonstration. The protesters were attempting to march to Montgomery, Alabama. Televised coverage of the attack mobilized efforts for the civil rights movement. Parks lived in Detroit at the time but returned to the South to speak to the marchers. 

The Freedom Now Party was a Black Nationalist political party in the United States supported by Malcolm X. The party emphasized militant tactics and aimed to promote Black candidates for U.S. political office. Its platforms focused on gaining Black representation in political power structures and criticized the failure of both the Democratic and the Republican Party to address the needs of Black voters. Although Parks did not join the Freedom Now Party, she supported the cause by making appearances and following the party’s work as a great admirer of Malcolm X who shared his belief in the power of and need for self-defense.

The Freedom Train was an exhibit that ran between 1947-1949. Trains were instructed to stop in 48 states to show the Emancipation Proclamation and other important historical documents. One of the federal government’s stipulations was that these exhibits must be desegregated; this provoked such outrage that the Freedom Train bypassed many cities. Parks worked diligently to secure the train’s visit and took a great risk by taking a youth group to see the exhibit in a state that still strongly embraced segregation and racism. One of the youth Parks worked with was Claudette Colvin, who refused to give up her own seat on a bus several months before Parks’s protest.

Started by Myles Horton, the Highlander Folk School was an endeavor to educate young activists. Rosa Parks found the Highlander Folk School to be highly inspirational. She attended a two-week program there on scholarship in 1955 to gain training on the implementation of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling. Her husband was hesitant for her to participate in the school’s program due to concern about repercussions against her, and she was a victim of red-baiting later due to the school’s communist ties.

The phrase Jim Crow laws refers to state and local laws that were in effect for approximately 100 years, from the post-Civil War era to the mid-1960s. These laws enforced racial segregation and systemic racism and were the basis for school segregation and policies such as the maintenance of separate train cars and bus sections for white and Black people. Rosa Parks criticized the way Jim Crow solidified second-class citizenship for Black Americans. She explained the thought process behind her refusal to give up her bus seat as a rejection of the Jim Crow system’s continual degradation of Black people.

The March on Washington refers to the historical event in August 1963 during which 250,000 people gathered in Washington, D.C., in front of the Lincoln Memorial to protest segregation and call for economic equality, voting rights, and other civil rights protections. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech at the march. Rosa Parks also attended and spoke to the crowds. Similar to the sanitization of Parks’s image, this protest and King’s speech became recast as part of what the author describes as the fable of the civil rights movement, with the media highlighting the aspects that are most palatable to white middle-class Americans. 

For a decade prior to her refusal to give up her bus seat, Parks worked for the NAACP and the MIA. She devoted her time to educating herself and advocating for voting rights, justice, and desegregation. After her arrest, the MIA, under King’s leadership, organized a carpool system in response to the bus boycott. The organization made a few meager requests of the mayor and city commissioners, including a first-come, first-served basis for bus seating, but the requests were denied. Local newspapers threatened the boycotters, King’s and Nixon’s homes were bombed, and Parks’s family received a plethora of threatening phone calls in response to the arrest and the MIA’s actions.

NAACP is the acronym for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. The organization was formed in 1909 and continues to advocate for civil rights and to dismantle systems of oppression. Parks devoted her life to helping the NAACP and other organizations. Her husband introduced her to the organization prior to their marriage. She worked for the NAACP for 10 years prior to her 1955 refusal to give up her bus seat. After becoming a public figure, she continued to raise funds for the NAACP, speaking on the organization’s behalf at no charge and donating any fees she received.

Red-baiting refers to the harassment of those known to be or rumored to be associated with the Communist Party. Parks was a victim of red-baiting because of her association with the Highlander Folk School. Accusing activists of communism was a common tactic used to increase paranoia and public fear of their work, painting them as a threat to American democracy. In part as a result of these accusations, Parks and her family suffered numerous threats, job instability, and health problems.

The Scottsboro Trial covered the conviction of nine boys in Alabama who were accused of raping two white women in 1931. Despite a lack of evidence to declare the boys guilty, all nine were convicted. The case is recognized for its injustice. At the time of Parks’s wedding to Raymond in 1932, he was involved in fighting for the freedom of these young men, known as the Scottsboro Boys. The couple was threatened and intimidated by white supremacists and local law enforcement as retaliation for his efforts.