Racial Imagination and the American Dream

This book considers the American dream from the perspective of three of its most successful African American advocates - Ralph Bunche, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Barack Obama - examining their self-perception in relation to that dream and the effects of their achievements on societal perceptions of the American dream and Blacks themselves.

Charles P. Henry is Professor Emeritus of African American Studies at the University of California at Berkeley, USA, and Chair of the Board of the Center for Victims of Torture. He is the author/editor of nine books including Black Studies and the Democratization of American Higher Education and Long Overdue: The Politics of Racial Reparations, the editor of Foreign Policy and the Black (Inter)national Interest, and the co-editor of The Obama Phenomenon: Toward a Multiracial Democracy.

1. Introduction 2. Ralph Bunche: A Worldview of Race 3. King's Dream 4. Barack Obama: Reclaiming the American Dream 5. American Exceptionalism: The American Dream Exported 6. Reimagining Racial Reparations