Alex Haley Quotes

When you say that you are a race man, it means that you embrace the entire black community regardless of the hue, whether somebody is very light and could pass for possibly white or someone is very dark.

I don't mind being black. I'm black out loud. It's more than the people that they are, it's the condition that they represent.

I think Black people need to take self-esteem seriously.

My black brothers and sisters - of all religious beliefs, or of no religious beliefs - we all have in common the greatest binding tie we could have. We are all black people!

The relationship of black Americans to Obama is sociologically riveting.

I'm black, and it's a very important part of what I am. I'm not embarrassed about it.

I'm black because I was born this way. I'm proud of it. Thank God I am who I am.

Supporting black professional athletes was taken seriously in my home.

Malcolm X never renounced and never stepped away from a strong commitment to black nationalism and black self-determination. That's absolutely clear if you do any analysis of his speeches.

I'm a black American, I am proud of my race. I am proud of who I am. I have a lot of pride and dignity.

The Black skin is not a badge of shame, but rather a glorious symbol of national greatness.

It would seem that some black people want to say that when you, as a black, become successful, you cease to be black. That's ridiculous.

I used to joke for years that I was a black man. I adopted the black culture, the black race. I married a black woman, and I had black kids. I always considered myself a 'brother.'

I know black people love the idea that we finally have a beautiful, good-looking black president. But if he is doing awful things to us, we should wake up.

Learn to love being black.

Blackness is a state of mind, and I identify with the black community. Mainly, because I realized, early on, when I walk into a room, people see a black woman, they don't see a white woman. So out of that reason alone, I identify more with the black community.

I would say I'm black because my parents said I'm black. I'm black because my mother's black. I'm black because I grew up in a family of all black people. I knew I was black because I grew up in an all-white neighborhood. And my parents, as part of their protective mechanisms that they were going to give to us, made it very clear what we were.

As for my support for Obama, remember that I was brought up in Washington. It was an all-black city when I was a kid. And I've always been very pro-African-American - or whatever phrase we now use.

The Nation of Islam's main focus was teaching black pride and self-awareness. Why should we keep trying to force ourselves into white restaurants and schools when white people didn't want us? Why not clean up our own neighborhoods and schools instead of trying to move out of them and into white people's neighborhoods?

I'm black, I don't feel burdened by it and I don't think it's a huge responsibility. It's part of who I am. It does not define me.

We cannot continually barricade ourselves under some falsified idea of race, because our idea of blackness and race is simply reactionary. Africans didn't walk around Africa being black and proud, they walked around proud.

To my mind, it is the duty of the younger Negro artist, if he accepts any duties at all from outsiders, to change through the force of his art that old whispering 'I want to be white,' hidden in the aspirations of his people, to 'Why should I want to be white? I am a Negro - and beautiful!'

I think Barack Obama was born into a home not just to a white woman and white grandparents, but a white woman and white grandparents who shockingly told him it was okay that he was black and that he should not be ashamed of it and that he should, in fact, be proud of it.

I think, as a black man, I have a responsibility to have knowledge and have an opinion.

I still enjoy a lot of support from the black community.