De man achter de schermen

Bayard Rustin en de Amerikaanse burgerrechtenbeweging

Samenvatting

Bayard Rustin was an activist in the civil rights movement. He
is known as the man behind Martin Luther King Jr. and as the
organizer of the March on Washington. The research question
of this historiographical article is: what was the role of Bayard
Rustin in the civil rights movement, according to historians?
First, we will look at the ways Rustin has influenced the
movement. Next, we will learn more about Rustin’s ideology, and
at how it may have changed in the 1960s according to historians.
Last, we will discuss the role of Rustin’s homosexuality on his
career. In this article, the view of different historians will be
discussed. By analysing Rustin’s career, we learn that the civil
right movement was not only build upon King, but by many
others as well. It can give us a more complex insight in to the
history of the civil rights movement.