This is a fabulous investigation of thought and research into a very difficult area that needs attentions. It really reflects that previously there was a chance at decency and scholarship in prisons, like what Malcolm X achieved in prison and how it help launched the study for his profound activism. After this time time period, especially in the 1980s, the private prison system became terrible and seemed to work to deliberately destroy the “militancy” of organizing groups like Mr. Jackson’s. These prisoners need to be humanized, shown to have a deep humanity.
I recently thought I object to the term “militant” and “militancy” as when re-examining Malcom X’s carefully chosen language, he never advocated for anything other than really self-defense. He had the correct attitude that if a white man or group of men come into your house or on your property, then you have a right to defend yourself with guns. That I thought was the point of the black panthers as well. I believe Malcom would have been much more highly aware of the routine lynchings and massacres from the first half of the 20th century when organized groups of white men often invaded black areas, black homes and hunting black men who they falsely accused and summarily executed on site with no trial.
This word of militancy has since been used against those like the panthers who were seeking self defense, as the police often raid the black areas of town using vastly excessive force to black Americans who were upset, rightly so, about a perceived injustice. Or just to terrorize them like the in 1979 Greensboro massacre. This word is abused I think to this day by supremacists and GOP strategists, but I could be wrong.