Kansas City gets a gift this month. One of the sharpest living interpreters of Africa and the Black world, legendary Black author Howard W. French, is coming to town to talk about his new book, The Second Emancipation. And the conversation will be guided by none other than Baba Mickey Dean, a legendary KC elder, freedom fighter, and pillar of the National Black United Front-KC.
French’s book traces the mid-20th century wave that cracked colonialism open across the African continent. In 1957, Ghana’s independence under Kwame Nkrumah lit a fuse. Dozens of nations claimed freedom in the years that followed. French calls this tidal shift a “movement of global Blackness,” a world-level reordering powered by African people and our allies. That history shaped the very conditions we live in today, from diaspora politics to the fight over resources, debt, borders, and the meaning of self-determination.
The Kansas City Public Library is hosting French for a Signature Event titled “The Second Emancipation: Nkrumah, Pan-Africanism, and Global Blackness at High Tide.” It takes place Thursday, Aug. 21, 6–7 p.m., at the Plaza Branch, 4801 Main St. RSVP at kclibrary.org/events.
Why this matters now
We live in an era of escalating resource grabs, digital colonialism, and genocidal wars. The same empires that once planted flags now construct cop cities, extractive data centers and AI surveillance pipelines. The Second Emancipation reminds us that liberation is not a metaphor and the ideas at the heart of Pan-Africanism are not museum pieces. They are tools that teach discipline, internationalism, and the habit of building with each other across borders.
Nkrumah argued that political independence without economic sovereignty is a trap. That warning should ring loud for every Black movement in America navigating liberal capture, surveillance budgets, and austerity dressed up as “revitalization.” French’s work helps us connect the dots between Accra and Kansas City, between 1957 and 2025, between the colonial playbook and its local spinoffs.
What to expect
French is a professor, a veteran journalist, and a bestselling author. In The Second Emancipation he places Africa at the center of world history. Expect a clear, panoramic account of how liberation surged and what it demanded: movements, mass education, political discipline, international alliances, and a cultural confidence that refuses to negotiate our humanity.
Bring your people. Bring your questions. Bring your curiosity about how this wave of freedom reshaped the globe and what a Third Emancipation might look like in our time.
Event details
- What: The Second Emancipation: Nkrumah, Pan-Africanism, and Global Blackness at High Tide
- Who: Howard W. French
- When: Thu, Aug. 21, 6–7 p.m.
- Where: Plaza Branch, 4801 Main St.
- RSVP: kclibrary.org/events
Our take
The Defender believes political education is a material resource. Nights like this are how we grow sharper together. Study is not homework but preparation. Our ancestors built organizations, trained cadres, learned history, and practiced strategy. This event is one more step in that long line of beautiful, disciplined work.
We will see you there. Bring a friend. Then let’s talk about how we turn study into power.
