MXGM Self-Defence Manual

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Malcolm X Grassroots Movement March 2013
A Short History of Self-Defense Organizing in the New
Afrikan Community
The following articles are only a brief sample of some of the critical works that explore our
history of protracted struggle to defend ourselves from the forces of white supremacy and
capitalist exploitation. These articles are from Akinyele Umoja from the New Afrikan
People’s Organization and the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement and New Afrikan Political
Prisoner Russell “Maroon” Shoatz.
Akinyele Omowale Umoja
Akinyele Omowale Umoja is an educator and scholar-activist.
Dr. Umoja has varied experiences as an educator. He has taught
in secondary schools, alternative schools, and colleges and
universities, as well as developed Afrikan-centered curriculum for
public schools and community education programs.
Currently, he is an Associate Professor and department chair in
the Department of African-American Studies at Georgia State
University (GSU). At GSU, Umoja is responsible for teaching
courses related to the history of people of African descent in
Georgia, the Civil Rights Movement and other Black political
and social movements, courses on the enslavement of African
people in the New World, African religion and philosophy, and
19th and 20th century Black political and social movements.
Dr. Umoja’s writing has been featured in scholarly publications as The Journal of Black
Studies, New Political Science, The International Journal of Africana Studies, Black Scholar, Radical
History Review and Socialism and Democracy. Umoja was one of the contributors to Blackwell
Companion on African-American History, edited by Alton Hornsby; The Black Panther Party
Reconsidered, edited by Charles Earl Jones; Liberation, Imagination, and the Black Panther Party,
edited by Kathleen Cleaver andGeorge Katisaficus; and "Malcolm X: A Historical Reader",
edited by James Conyers and Andrew Smallwood. Umoja's first single authored book titled
WE WILL SHOOT BACK: ARMED RESISTANCE IN THE MISSISSIPPI FREEDOM
MOVEMENT is due to be published by New York University Press in April 2013.
Umoja has been active over thirty-five years in the liberation struggle of Afrikan people,
particularly working with the New Afrikan Independence Movement. He is a founding
member of the New Afrikan Peoples Organization and the Malcolm X Grassroots
Movement. Brother Umoja has represented both organizations nationally and in international
forums in the Caribbean, Africa, and Europe. He is particularly committed to work to support
and gain amnesty for political prisoners and prisoners of war and to win reparations for
Afrikan people. Umoja has also involved himself in the solidarity movement for democracy
and self-determination of Haiti.
Dr. Umoja has been a contributor to commercial and popular documentaries on the
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