Malcolm X on Education

Malcolm X is a fascinating person to approach as an educational thinker - not because he was an academic or had any scholastic achievements but as an example of what can be achieved by someone who engages in 'homemade' or self-education.

Malcolm X (1925 – 1965) was born as Malcolm Little in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1925. His father was a Baptist minister and a strong devotee of the Black leader Marcus Garvey. Garvey’s message, as many readers will be familiar, was that Black people in America would never be able to live in peace and harmony with white Americans and their only hope of salvation was to move as a people back to their roots in Africa. Malcolm’s father died when he was six and his mother was put in a mental home when he was about twelve. As a result, his many brothers and sisters were split up and put into different foster homes.

Malcolm left school early and eventually drifted North and finally settled in Harlem, New York, on his own, at the age of 17...Read on