Taken from "The Talented Tenth" written by W. E. B. Du Bois: The Negro race, like all races, is going to be saved by its exceptional men. The problem of education, then, among Negroes must first of all deal with the Talented Tenth; it is the problem of developing the Best of this race that they may guide the Mass away from the contamination and death of the Worst, in their own and other races. Now the training of men is a difficult and intricate task. Its technique is a matter for educational experts, but its object is for the vision of seers. If we make money the object of man-training, we shall develop money-makers but not necessarily men; if we make technical skill the object of education, we may possess artisans but not, in nature, men. Men we shall have only as we make manhood the object of the work of the schools-intelligence, broad sympathy, knowledge of the world that was and is, and of the relation of men to it-this is the curriculum of that Higher Education which must underlie true life. On this foundation we may build bread winning, skill of hand and quickness of brain, with never a fear lest the child and man mistake the means of living for the object of life.

This study describes the historical factors leading to and influencing development of Du Bois's radical "Talented Tenth" strategy for education and training in leadership that would transform the larger African American population and lead them to higher levels of social acceptance and independence.

W.E.B. DU BOIS' role as a contributor to educational thought was ignored throughout his lifetime and has been sparsely considered in the fifty years after his death. Many of the twenty-eight writings contained here have not been viewed in the context of Du Bois' educational thought. This selection of Du Bois' writings is divided into three sections. The first section contains the writings of an adolescent Du Bois, who even at the age of fifteen, had the vision to encourage the people of his hometown to engage in literacy activities and to increase their political awareness. The second section contains the works that led to Du Bois earning his Harvard doctorate, including a tersely worded letter to former President Rutherford B. Hayes when it appeared that Du Bois might have initially been denied a fellowship. The third section includes writings where Du Bois assumed a more combative posture, but in doing so displayed the fire and passion that made him a most influential, although ignored, educational thinker. These writings demonstrate that Du Bois was not an incidental thinker about education—he was a cornerstone contributor.

In Transcending the Talented Tenth, Joy James provocatively examines African American intellectual responses to racism and the role of elitism, sexism and anti-radicalism in black leadership politics throughout history. She begins with Du Bois' construction of "the Talented Tenth" as an elite leadership of race managers and takes us through the lives and work of radical women in the anti-lynching crusades, the civil rights and black liberation movements, as well as explores the contemporary struggles among black elites in academe.

First published in 1911, The Quest of the Silver Fleece is set in Washington, D.C., and Alabama. The silver fleece refers to the cotton industry, owned by powerful white men, who continued to make their fortune through the labor of African-Americans. In the story, Blessed Alwyn tries to come to terms with how a black man can integrate into society. He gets an education and moves to Washington, where he meets well-to-do blacks who seem to be living the kind of lives slaves had struggled for. Only, Blessed comes to find out, they have to make many compromises in order to be accepted by their white neighbors. Anyone with an interest in race relations and life at the turn of the 20th century will find this book about economics, race, love, and the hero's quest an astute sociological study. American writer, civil rights activist, and scholar WILLIAM EEDWARD BURGHARDT DUBOIS (1868-1963) was the first black man to receive a PhD from Harvard University. A cofounder of the NAACP, he wrote a number of important books, including The Philadelphia Negro (1899), Black Folk, Then and Now (1899), and The Negro (1915).