Henry McNeal Turner (1834-1915) was a bishop of the African Methodist
Episcopal Church, one of America's earliest Black activists and social
reformers, and an outspoken proponent of emigration. In The Speeches of
Bishop Henry McNeal Turner: The Press, the Platform, and the Pulpit,
Andre E. Johnson has compiled selected political speeches, sermons,
lectures, and religious addresses delivered by Turner in their original
form.
Alongside Turner's oratory, Johnson places the speeches in their
historical context and traces his influence on Black social movements in
the twentieth century, from W. E. B. Du Bois's idea of cultural
nationalism to Marcus Garvey's "Back to Africa" movement, the modern-day
civil rights movement, the Black Power movement, James Cone's Black
liberation theology, and more. While Turner was widely known as a great
orator and published copious articles, essays, and editorials, no single
collection of only Turner's speeches has yet been published, and
scholars have largely ignored his legacy. This volume recovers a lost
voice within American and African American rhetorical history, expanding
the canon of the African American oratorical tradition.