Skip to main content
University of California Press

About the Book

How Myles Horton and the Highlander Folk School catalyzed social justice and democratic education
 

For too long, the story of life-changing teacher and activist Myles Horton has escaped the public spotlight. An inspiring and humble leader whose work influenced the civil rights movement, Horton helped thousands of marginalized people gain greater control over their lives. Born and raised in early twentieth-century Tennessee, Horton was appalled by the disrespect and discrimination that was heaped on poor people—both black and white—throughout Appalachia. He resolved to create a place that would be available to all, where regular people could talk, learn from one another, and get to the heart of issues of class and race, and right and wrong. And so in 1932, Horton cofounded the Highlander Folk School, smack in the middle of Tennessee.

The first biography of Myles Horton in twenty-five years, Education in Black and White focuses on the educational theories and strategies he first developed at Highlander to serve the interests of the poor, the marginalized, and the oppressed. His personal vision keenly influenced everyone from Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr., to Eleanor Roosevelt and Congressman John Lewis. Stephen Preskill chronicles how Horton gained influence as an advocate for organized labor, an activist for civil rights, a supporter of Appalachian self-empowerment, an architect of an international popular-education network, and a champion for direct democracy, showing how the example Horton set remains education’s best hope for today.

About the Author

Stephen Preskill is a writing consultant at Columbia University. During his thirty years as a university professor, he specialized in American educational history and leadership studies. He has coauthored four previous books concerning teacher narratives, democratic discussion, and social justice leadership.
 

From Our Blog

How May Day 1930 Hastened Myles Horton’s Radical Labor Activism

By Stephen Preskill, author of Education in Black and White: Myles Horton and the Highlander Center's Vision for Social JusticeMay Day in 1930 America was a dismal affair. In the first months of the year, the United States, like much of the rest of the world, was sinking into a deep economic dep
Read More

Table of Contents

Prologue: The Highlander Fire of 2019

Introduction 
1. Beginnings
2. The Lessons of Ozone
3. Graduate Education and Denmark's Folk Schools
4. Highlander's Beginnings
5. Building a More Stable Highlander
6. Zilphia Horton and Highlander's "Singing Army"
7. Racial Equality within the Union Movement
8. The White Supremacist versus the Social Egalitarian
9. Mrs. Parks Goes to Highlander
10. The Citizenship School on Johns Island
11. Highlander and SNCC
12. From Civil Rights to Appalachia
13. Leadership and Research in Ivanhoe
14. Myles Horton, Internationalist 
15. We Make the Road by Walking
Epilogue

Acknowledgments 
Notes
Works Cited 
Index

Reviews

"With Education in Black and White, Stephen Preskill revisits and revives the story of Myles Horton and Tennessee’s Highlander Center. . . . a lucidly written book."
Chapter 16
"The most thorough study of Highlander and its founder to date."
Black Perspectives
"Stephen Preskill's Education in Black and White is a vital new addition to scholarship in the history of social movements in the United States."
Peace & Change
"At a moment when democratic traditions are under assault, this book could hardly be more timely. The story of Myles Horton and Highlander reminds us that the late twentieth-century movements for social justice were often movements of democratic aspirations, committed to developing the untapped potential of the oppressed."—Charles M. Payne, author of I've Got the Light of Freedom: The Organizing Tradition and the Mississippi Freedom Struggle

"As a former staff member of Highlander, I had the privilege of learning from and with Myles Horton over two decades. This well-researched book captures the Highlander Center's unique approach to using popular education to deepen democracy and strengthen struggles for social justice—a story that is both instructive and inspirational for our times."—John Gaventa, author of Power and Powerlessness: Quiescence and Rebellion in an Appalachian Valley

"In this absorbing biography, Stephen Preskill transports us to another era. Miles Horton, a great humanitarian who lived and worked in a strikingly relevant time and place in America, spent his earliest days among the poorest people of the South. Told through his monumental contributions to our labor and civil rights movements, the story unfolds in colorful detail. As we now face an uncertain tomorrow, it is more important than ever to explore the troubled waters of the past to guide our future, and with this book, Preskill provides a useful sextant to help us navigate."—Mick Caouette, filmmaker

"This book is important. It should have a wide readership among educators from multiple settings, social activists, organizers, and leaders."—Stephen Brookfield, Distinguished Scholar, Antioch University