Black Quotes

• 

  The Black skin is not a badge of shame, but rather a glorious symbol of national greatness.

  Marcus Garvey

  Greatness, Racism, Skins

  1234 Copy quote

• Black women . . . work because their husbands can't make enough money at their jobs to keep everything going. . . . They don't go to work to find fulfillment, or adventure, or glamour and romance, like so many white women think they are doing. Black women work out of necessity.

  Wilma Rudolph

  Jobs, Husband, Adventure

  Wilma Rudolph (1977). “Wilma”

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• In the early 1970s in Atlanta, I attended what had formerly been an all-white school but had become a black school after integration and white flight. Perhaps because of this, the teachers created a curriculum that included a focus on African American literature and history year-round, not just in February.

  Natasha Trethewey

  Teacher, School, Atlanta

  7 Copy quote

• We cannot continually barricade ourselves under some falsified idea of race, because our idea of blackness and race is simply reactionary. Africans didnt walk around Africa being black and proud, they walked around proud.

  Saul Williams

  Race, Ideas, Proud

  6 Copy quote

• ...black women write differently from white women. This is the most marked difference of all those combinations of black and white, male and female. It's not so much that women write differently from men, but that black women write differently from white women. Black men don't write very differently from white men.

  Toni Morrison

  Writing, Black And White, Men

  Toni Morrison, Danille Kathleen Taylor-Guthrie (1994). “Conversations with Toni Morrison”, p.161, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered.

  Nelson Mandela

  Inspirational, Change, Inspiring

  Nelson Mandela (2011). “Nelson Mandela By Himself: The Authorised Book of Quotations”, p.191, Pan Macmillan

  80 Copy quote

  Show source

• We black men have a hard enough time in our own struggle for justice, and already have enough enemies as it is, to make the drastic mistake of attacking each other and adding more weight to an already unbearable load.

  Malcolm X

  Mistake, Struggle, Men

  87 Copy quote

• Where there is no vision, there is no hope.

  George Washington Carver

  Inspirational, Leadership, Hope

  339 Copy quote

• If Black women stand strong and our commitment is to ending domination I know that I'm supporting Black males, Black children male and female Black elderly because the bottom line is the struggle to end domination in all its forms.

  Bell Hooks

  Strong, Children, Struggle

  Interview with Pierce Freelon, blackademics.org. October, 2006.

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• Freedom is never given; it is won.

  A. Philip Randolph

  Inspirational, Freedom, 4th Of July

  Keynote speech given at the Second National Negro Congress, 1937.

  155 Copy quote

  Show source

• There can be no black-white unity until there is first some black unity... We cannot think of uniting with others, until after we have first united among ourselves. We cannot think of being acceptable to others until we have first proven acceptable to ourselves.

  Malcolm X

  Thinking, White, Unity

  "A Declaration of Independence" by Malcolm X, teachingamericanhistory.org. March 12, 1964.

  332 Copy quote

  Show source

• Never be limited by other people's limited imaginations.

  Mae Jemison

  Inspiring, People, Imagination

  264 Copy quote

• If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude.

  Maya Angelou

  Inspirational, Motivational, Change

  Twitter post from Jan 15, 2017

  480 Copy quote

  Show source

• Me only have one ambition, y'know. I only have one thing I really like to see happen. I like to see mankind live together - black, white, Chinese, everyone - that's all.

  Bob Marley

  Love, Ambition, White

  117 Copy quote

• It's not the load that breaks you down, it's the way you carry it.

  Lou Holtz

  Inspirational, Sports, Attitude

  61 Copy quote

• It isn't a matter of black is beautiful as much as it is white is not all that's beautiful.

  Bill Cosby

  Funny, Beautiful, Hair

  85 Copy quote
• 

  If there was no Black Sabbath, I could still possibly be a morning newspaper delivery boy. No fun.

  Lars Ulrich

  Morning, Fun, Boys

  "Skynyrd, Sabbath, Blondie join rock's elite". The Associated Press, www.today.com. March 14, 2006.

  78 Copy quote

  Show source

• For Africa to me... is more than a glamorous fact. It is a historical truth. No man can know where he is going unless he knows exactly where he has been and exactly how he arrived at his present place.

  Maya Angelou

  Inspirational, Truth, Men

  1972 On Africa. In the New York Times,16 Apr.

  55 Copy quote

  Show source

• A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere.

  Groucho Marx

  Inspirational, Funny, Cat

  180 Copy quote

• The basic tenet of black consciousness is that the black man must reject all value systems that seek to make him a foreigner in the country of his birth and reduce his basic human dignity.

  Steven Biko

  Country, Men, Dignity

  Steven Biko (1979). “Steve Biko: Black Consciousness in South Africa”, Vintage

  395 Copy quote

  Show source

• We black men seem the sole oasis of simple faith and reverence in a dusty desert of dollars and smartness.

  W. E. B. Du Bois

  Simple, Men, Oasis

  W. E. B. Du Bois (2014). “The Souls of Black Folk: The Oxford W. E. B. Du Bois”, p.32, Oxford University Press

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• I felt that one had better die fighting against injustice than to die like a dog or rat in a trap. I had already determined to sell my life as dearly as possible if attacked. I felt if I could take one lyncher with me, this would even up the score a little bit.

  Ida B. Wells

  Dog, Fighting, Black History

  Ida B. Wells (2013). “Crusade for Justice: The Autobiography of Ida B. Wells”, p.62, University of Chicago Press

  310 Copy quote

  Show source
• 

  Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Love, Inspirational, Life

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2012). “A Gift of Love: Sermons from Strength to Love and Other Preachings”, p.67, Beacon Press

  1179 Copy quote

  Show source

• Do not call for black power or green power. Call for brain power.

  Barbara Jordan

  Inspirational, Freedom, Memorable

  112 Copy quote

• Actually I don't remember being born, it must have happened during one of my black outs.

  Jim Morrison

  Funny, Music, Nightlife

  69 Copy quote