W. E. B. DuBois
By: Simi Kunin
Who He Was
W. E. B. DuBois was a scholar, editor, educator, and activist. He was born on February 23, 1868 in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, and he died in Accra, Ghana on August 17, 1963. He graduated from Fisk University in 1888, and then got a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1895. DuBois became assistant instructor in sociology at the University of Pennsylvania in 1896 to 1897.
Work With NAACP
In 1909, there was the creation of the National Negro Committee. At the second meeting of the NNC, the attendees created the NAACP. He helped found the NAACP or the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People, and edited it's magazine "The Crisis".
Civil Rights, Activism, and Racism
In 1903, DuBois wrote a book called The Souls of Black Folk, in which you can see many of his ideas. W. E. B. DuBois had an argument with Booker T. Washington about the way to gain equal rights. DuBois said that equal rights could be gained by more political action and civil rights marches/demonstrations, while Washington argued that in order to gain equal rights they would have to accept the discrimination for the time being and elevate themselves through hard work and material prosperity.