Angela Yvonne Davis (born January 26, 1944) is an American political activist, scholar, and author. She emerged as a prominent counterculture activist and radical in the 1960s as a leader of the Communist Party USA, and had close relations with the Black Panther Party through her involvement in the Civil Rights Movement, despite never being an official member of the party. Prisoner rights have been among her interests; she is the founder of Critical Resistance, an organization working to abolish the prison-industrial complex. She is a retired professor with the History of Consciousness Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a former director of the university's Feminist Studies department.Davis was arrested, charged, tried, and acquitted of conspiracy in the 1970 armed take-over of a Marin County courtroom, in which four persons died.Her research interests are feminism, African-American studies, critical theory, Marxism, popular music, social consciousness, and the philosophy and history of punishment and prisons. Her membership in the Communist Party led to Ronald Reagan's request in 1969 to have her barred from teaching at any university in the State of California. She was twice a candidate for Vice President on the Communist Party USA ticket during the 1980s.
NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work, Nonfiction
Movies
The History Makers: Courage
Star Sign
Aquarius
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Quote
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Progressive art can assist people to learn not only about the objective forces at work in the society in which they live, but also about the intensely social character of their interior lives. Ultimately, it can propel people toward social emancipation.
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Fact
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In a relationship for many years with Bettina Aptheker, the daughter of political activist Herbert Aptheker.
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Tenured professor at University of Santa Cruz, California. [2002]
3
Joined the Communist Party when Martin Luther King was assassinated in 1968, and ran for U.S. Vice President on the Communist Party ticket in 1980.
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In 1969 she was removed from her teaching position at UCLA as a result of her membership of the Communist Party. Then-governor Ronald Reagan swore she would never teach in the University of California system again.
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In 1970, Davis was implicated in an aborted prison escape in Northern California; she was accused of supplying the gun that killed four people during the incident. An intense police search drove her underground, and she became subject of a nationwide manhunt that resulted in 16 months of imprisonment. After an international "Free Angela Davis" campaign, she was acquitted of the charges in 1972.
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In 1970 was on the FBI's most wanted list.
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Former member of the Black Panthers and the Communist party.
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Activist, author and tenured professor.
Actress
Title
Year
Status
Character
Never Leave Nevada
1990
Neighbor
Self
Title
Year
Status
Character
Black and Cuba
2013
Documentary completed
Herself
13TH
2016
Documentary
Herself
Democracy Now!
2010-2016
TV Series
Herself
The Empire Files
2016
TV Series documentary
Herself - Author, Scholar and Activist
P.O.V.
2014-2015
TV Series documentary
Herself
Out in the Night
2014
Documentary
Herself
American Revolutionary: The Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs
2013
Documentary
Herself
Alice Walker: Beauty in Truth
2013
Documentary
Herself (as Angela Y. Davis)
Le grand journal de Canal+
2013
TV Series documentary
Herself
Long Distance Revolutionary: A Journey with Mumia Abu-Jamal
2012
Documentary
Herself
Pieces of Lives, Pieces of Dreams
2012
Documentary
Herself
Free Angela and All Political Prisoners
2012
Documentary
Herself
Independent Lens
2012
TV Series documentary
Black Girls Rock! 2011
2011
TV Movie
Herself
The Great Incarcerator, Part 1: Dark Little Secret
2011
Documentary
Herself
The Hour
2011
TV Series
Herself
The Black Power Mixtape 1967-1975
2011
Documentary
Herself (voice)
The Black List: Volume Two
2009
TV Movie documentary
Herself
Sidney Poitier, un outsider à Hollywood
2008
TV Movie documentary
The U.S. vs. John Lennon
2006
Documentary
Herself
XXI Century
2003
TV Series documentary
Herself - University of California, Santa Cruz
Fidel
2001
Documentary
Herself
Herbert's Hippopotamus
1996
Documentary
Herself
Jean Genet, le vagabond: Jean Genet, l'écrivain
1996
TV Movie documentary
Herself
Black Is... Black Ain't
1994
Documentary
Herself
Emma and Elvis
1993
Herself
A Place of Rage
1991
Documentary
Herself
The Arsenio Hall Show
1989
TV Series
Herself
Les rendez-vous du dimanche
1978
TV Series
Herself
Ben Chavis, les dix de Wilmington
1977
Documentary short
Herself
Black Journal
1976
TV Series
Herself
Apostrophes
1975
TV Series
Herself
The Mike Douglas Show
1974
TV Series
Herself - Activist
Wer die Erde liebt
1973
Documentary
Herself
First Tuesday
1972
TV Series
Herself
Angela Davis: Portrait of a Revolutionary
1972
Documentary
Herself
This Week
1971
TV Series
Herself
Genet parle d'Angela Davis
1970
Short
Herself
Archive Footage
Title
Year
Status
Character
Democracy Now!
2013-2014
TV Series
Herself
Occupy Unmasked
2012
Documentary
Herself
Stage Left: A Story of Theater in San Francisco
2011
Documentary
Herself
The UCLA Dynasty
2007
TV Movie documentary
Herself
And You Don't Stop: 30 Years of Hip-Hop
2004
TV Mini-Series documentary
Herself
A Huey P. Newton Story
2001
TV Movie documentary
Herself (uncredited)
Malcolm X
1992
Himself - Giving Black Power Salute at Olympics (uncredited)