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The ninth and tenth sections of Freedom Is a Constant Struggle are speeches that both stress the role of history in freedom struggles. In the first of the two, which she delivered at Davidson College in February 2013, Davis draws connections between the civil rights movement and the Obama era. In the speech in the tenth section, given two years later in January 2015, at Boğaziçi University in Istanbul, Turkey, Davis asserts that it is necessary to study the history of other movements and peoples to understand not only their struggles but to provide new perspectives. Citing William Faulkner’s famous assertion from Requiem for a Nun, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past,” (which was paraphrased by Barack Obama), Davis argues that the past always lives into the present. The “ghosts of slavery” remain with us, shaping institutions and limiting lives and possibilities. But Davis explains that there are also ghosts of the civil rights movement—and they too need to be exorcised to make room for new forms of protest and activism, new leaders, and new causes. Nameless women imagined the civil rights movement into existence, and, Davis suggests, other nameless women are at this very moment shaping the freedom struggles of the future that will include fighting Islamophobia, xenophobia, and transphobia.

Read a brief essay about the role of history in freedom struggles.

In the book’s final speech, Davis reflects briefly on how history will remember her, arguing that this is the wrong question to ask. For Davis, the important thing to remember is that history is never individual. Her history will unfold with the histories of those she’s shared the struggle with for decades, including people in the audience listening to her speech. To think of her own history as a discrete story misunderstands the importance of the collective, which must continue to expand. To emphasize that the work of freedom is ongoing, Davis notes that, as bad as Americans are at talking about slavery and race, they are even worse at talking about settler colonialism and the seizure of lands from the Indigenous peoples of North America. This is also a history that will need to be faced and understood, she says, if her story is to be told accurately one day.

Read about an important quote in the book’s final speech.

Across both these talks, Davis returns to the problem of individualism. It is wrong, she insists, to think that racism can be resolved by focusing on individual actors, either as victims, as perpetrators, or as agents of change. In life, as in history, the emphasis must change. This is not to suggest that individuals should not receive justice or be held accountable but, instead, that the framework of analysis (and thus the remedy for oppressive structures) must shift. While there are substantial forces arrayed against this act of rethinking, Davis ends the volume with the optimism and hope of the collective. When combined in action, spirit, intellect, and body, Davis believes the extraordinary—freedom—will become possible.

Read about the fascinating life of Angela Y. Davis.

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