Black Consciousness Quotes:

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

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

topic: Country, Men, Black, Value Systems, Personal Dignity

Black Consciousness is an attitude of the mind and a way of life, the most positive call to emanate from the black world for a long time.

- Steven Biko

topic: Positive, Attitude, Long, Blackness, Emanate

The most potent weapon of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.

- Steven Biko

source: "White Racism and Black Consciousness" (paper presented at workshop sponsored by Abe Bailey Institute of Interracial Studies),Cape Town, South Africa, Jan. 1971

topic: Historical, Mind, Weapons, Black Consciousness

Being black is not a matter of pigmentation - being black is a reflection of a mental attitude.

- Steven Biko

source: "I Write What I Like: Selected Writings". Book by Steven Biko edited by Aelred Stubbs, www.huffingtonpost.com. 1978.

topic: Attitude, Reflection, Black, Mental Attitude, Black Consciousness

Black Consciousness is in essence the realization by the black man of the need to rally together with his brothers around the cause of their oppression.

- Steven Biko

topic: Brother, Men, Essence, Black Consciousness

It is better to die for an idea that will live, than to live for an idea that will die

- Steven Biko

source: "South Africa: Extremes in Black and Whites" by Scott Macleod, Time Magazine (p. 38), content.time.com. March 9, 1992.

topic: Ideas, Black Consciousness

You are either alive and proud or you are dead, and when you are dead, you can't care anyway.

- Steven Biko

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

topic: Proud, Alive, Care, Dead Alive, Black Consciousness

So as a prelude whites must be made to realise that they are only human, not superior. Same with Blacks. They must be made to realise that they are also human, not inferior.

- Steven Biko

topic: Made, Prelude, Realising, Black Consciousness

In time, we shall be in a position to bestow on South Africa the greatest possible gift - a more human face.

- Steven Biko

topic: Time, Faces, Humans, Black Consciousness

We do not want to be reminded that it is we, the indigenous people, who are poor and exploited in the land of our birth. These are concepts which the Black Consciousness approach wishes to eradicate from the black man's mind before our society is driven to chaos by irresponsible people from Coca-cola and hamburger cultural backgrounds.

- Steven Biko

topic: Men, Land, People, Indigenous People, Black Consciousness

One ever feels his twoness - an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.

- W. E. B. Du Bois

topic: Dark, Two, Soul, Two Souls, African American Love

Part of the approach envisaged in bringing about Black Consciousness has to be directed to the past, to seek to rewrite the history of the black man and to produce in it the heroes who form the core of the African background

- Steven Biko

topic: Hero, Past, Men, Black Consciousness

Black Consciousness therefore takes cognizance of the deliberateness of God's plan in creating Black people black.

- Steven Biko

topic: Creating, People, Black, Black People, Black Consciousness

In all fields black consciousness seeks to talk to the black man in a language that is his own

- Steven Biko

topic: Men, Black, Fields, Black Consciousness

Merely by describing yourself as black you have started on a road towards emancipation, you have committed yourself to fight against all forces that seek to use your blackness as a stamp that marks you out as a subservient being.

- Steven Biko

topic: Fighting, Black, Use, Blackness, Describe Yourself

Marcus Garvey was one of the first advocates of Black Power, and is still today the greatest spokesman ever to have been produced by the movement of Black Consciousness...He spoke to all Africans on the earth, whether they lived in Africa, South America, the West Indies or North America, and he made Blacks aware of their strength when united.

- Walter Rodney

topic: America, Black, Movement, South America, West Indies

What Black Consciousness seeks to do is to produce real black people who do not regard themselves as appendages to white society. We do not need to apologise for this because it is true that the white systems have produced through the world a number of people who are not aware that they too are people.

- Steven Biko

topic: Real, White, Numbers, Black Consciousness

In grammar school some of the girls had problems with me. My face was too light. My hair was too long. It was the black-consciousness period, and I felt really bad.

- Whitney Houston

topic: Girl, School, Light, Grammar School, Black Consciousness