For the Sake of Peace examines racism and injustice in the United States through the eyes of those of African descent. Historically America has promoted itself as the moral police promoting democracy across the globe, offering her perspectives and ideas to combat poverty and racial and ethnic violence. The rise of overt political racism and intolerance has made visible, for a global audience for the first time since the Civil Rights Movement, the deeply rooted systems of discrimination and identity-based conflicts in the United States, that gives rise to structural and direct violence. African Americans, like other minorities, find themselves in a unique position in this age as new forms of race lynching continue to go unchecked; voting rights continue to be suppressed; prisons continue to serve as a mechanism for disenfranchising minorities and the poor. This volume centers around an understanding of peace that is concerned with justice and racial equality. Highlighting the prevailing impact of anti-black racism and injustice, authors offer prescriptive and descriptive insight that will aid in understanding and overcoming these historical and contemporary obstacles to peace focusing on specific themes including civil rights, education, white supremacy, structural violence, ritual, reparations, and human rights. Interdisciplinary in perspective, the essays are written by leading and emerging scholars, activists, and practitioners from the viewpoints of history, conflict analysis and resolution, anthropology, ethics, theology, and philosophy. A foreword by The Rev. Canon Nontombi Naomi Tutu, daughter of Nobel Peace Prize–winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Cathedral Missioner for Racial and Economic Equity at The Cathedral of All Souls in Ashville, NC, highlights the importance of Africana perspectives in the global pursuit of peace and equality.

Table of Contents:
Foreword, Rev. Cannon Naomi Tutu Introduction, Charles L. Chavis, Jr. Part I: Racism: A Systemic Thing 1. Structural Violence Through the Lenses of Conflict Resolution and Reconciliation Comparative Case Study of America-South Africa Racial Politics, Siyabulela Mandela 2. Deconstructing the Origin and Myth of Black Criminality: Asserting Black Agency Over Black Lives and Black Communities, Wayne Rose 3. The Systemic Lynching of Trevyan Devon Rowe, Robert Hoggard Part II: Knowing the Past: Narrative Change and the Historical Perspective 4. Segregation, White Supremacy, and the Dangers of Political Opportunism: A Case Study of George Wallace and Hendrik Verwoerd, Matthew Washington 5. I Leave You a Desire to Live Harmoniously: Mary McLeod Bethune on Health and Wellness, Ida Jones 6. From Birmingham to Monrovia: Black Women and the Wait/Weight of Freedom, 1960-2005, Ajanet Rountree 7. ‘So Tried, So True:’ The Legacy of Student Led Protests at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Simone R. Barrett 8. Reparations and Reparations NOW! A Brief History of Compensatory Justice for the European Enslavement of Africans, Raymond Winbush Part III: Africana Cultural and Religious Perspectives on Peace 9. Ritual Remembrance and Protest as Embodied Pedagogy and its Role in Solidarity, Courtney Bryant Prince 10. Race, Rituals of Dissent, and Blackness in America, Oluwagbemiga Dasylva 11. For Renewal: Faith in the Fight for Dignity and Human Rights, Sandra Tombe 12. Carcasses of Memory: Intersectionality, Institutionalized Terrorism, and the Play on Black Bodies in America, David Olali