Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee

The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (or SNCC, pronounced "snick") was one of the primary institutions of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged in April of 1960 from student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina. SNCC began with an $800 grant from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Some of the original student members were organizers of sit-ins at segregated lunch counters in the southern United States. Its purpose then was to coordinate the use of nonviolent direct action to attack segregation and other forms of racism. SNCC played a leading role in the Freedom Rides, the 1963 March on Washington, Mississippi Freedom Summer and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party over the next few years. In the later part of the 1960s, led by fiery leaders like Stokely Carmichael, SNCC focused on Black Power, and then fighting against the Vietnam War. In 1969, SNCC officially changed its name to the Student National Coordinating Committee to reflect the broadening of its strategies.

Further reading

Archives

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

• Ellin (Joseph and Nancy) Freedom Summer Collection. Collection Number: M323. Dates: 1963 - 1988. Volume: 1.7 ft³ (48 L) The University of Southern Mississippi Libraries Special Collections. Retrieved 2 May 2005.

Books

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

• Carmichael, Stokely, et al. Ready for Revolution : The Life and Struggles of Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture). Scribner (15 February 2005) 848 pages. ISBN 0684850044.
• Carson, Claybourne. In Struggle, SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960's. Cambridge Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. 1981. ISBN 0674447271.
• Greenberg, Cheryl Lynn, ed. A Circle of Trust: Remembering SNCC. Rutgers University Press (1 February 1998). 274 pages. ISBN 0813524776.
• Hogan, Wesley C. How democracy travels: SNCC, Swarthmore students, and the growth of the student movement in the North, 1961-1964.
• Lewis, John. Walking With the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement. New York: Simon & Schuster. 1998.
• Sellers, Cleveland and Robert Terrell. The River of No Return: The Autobiography of a Black Militant and the Life and Death of SNCC. University Press of Mississippi; Reprint edition (1 November 1990). 289 pages. ISBN 087805474X.
• Zinn, Howard. SNCC: The New Abolitionists Boston: Beacon Press. 1964. ISBN 0896086798

Interviews

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

• Transcript: An Oral History with Terri Shaw. SNCC member and Freedom Summer participant. The University of Southern Mississippi Libraries Special Collections. Retrieved 2 May 2005.
• Interviews with civil rights workers from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Stanford University Project South oral history collection. Microfilming Corp. of America. 1975. ISBN 0884559904.

SNCC publications and documents

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

• Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee Founding Statement.
• Memorandum: on the SNCC Mississippi Summer Project Transcript. Oxford, Ohio: General Materials (ca. June 1964). Retrieved 2 May 2005.