In November 2020, friends of the W. E. B. Du Bois Eye shared a serial of quotes by Du Bois that resonate in our own time.

The quotes beneath were chosen by the 2019 accomplice of Du Bois Center graduate and postal service-doctoral fellows.

Du Bois Center Fellows Favorite Du Bois Quotes

Group portrait of Du Bois and friends and family at his 70th altogether celebration at Atlanta University, 1938.

"Between me and the other world there is ever an unasked question: unasked by some through feelings of effeminateness; past others through the difficulty of rightly framing information technology. All, however, palpitate round it. They approach me in a half-hesitant sort of way, eye me curiously or compassionately, and so, instead of saying directly, How does information technology feel to be a problem? they say, I know an splendid colored human in my town; or, I fought at Mechanicsville; or, Do not these Southern outrages make your blood eddy? At these I grin, or am interested, or reduce the humid to a simmer, every bit the occasion may enquire. To the existent question, How does it feel to be a problem? I answer seldom a word."

Westward. E. B. Du Boisin The Souls of Black Folk(1903)
Called by Jay Cephas, Assistant Professor of Compages and Urbanism at Northeastern Academy and 2019 Du Bois Eye Mail-Doctoral Fellow

"You are non and however you are: your thoughts, your deeds, above all your dreams still alive."

W. E. B. Du Bois in The Autobiography of West. E. B. Du Bois(1968)
Called by Freeden Blume Oeur, Associate Professor of Sociology and Education at Tufts Academy and 2019 Du Bois Center Post-Doctoral Fellow

"We say easily, for instance, 'The ignorant ought not to vote.' We would say, 'No civilized state should have citizens too ignorant to participate in government,' and this statement is merely a step to the fact: that no state is civilized which has citizens likewise ignorant to help rule it."

W. E. B. Du Bois in Of the Ruling of Men (1920)
Chosen by Adam Dahl, Assistant Professor of Political Scientific discipline at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Middle Post-Doctoral Fellow

"The slave went gratis; stood a brief moment in the dominicus; then moved back once more toward slavery."

W. E. B. Du Bois in Black Reconstruction in America (1935)
Chosen by Alexandria Russell, Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Department of History at Rutgers Academy and 2019 Du Bois Center Post-Doctoral Swain
Portrait taken by author and lensman Carl Van Vechten.

"Children larn more from what you are than what yous teach."

W. E. B. Du Bois
Chosen by Victoria I. Rizo Lenshyn, German and Scandinavian Studies, University of Massachusetts Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Heart Post-Doctoral Swain

"Reader of dead words who would live deeds, this is the flowering of my logic: I dream of a world of infinitive and valuable variety; not in the laws of gravity or diminutive weights, but in human variety in pinnacle and weight, color and skin, pilus and olfactory organ and lip. But more peculiarly and far above and beyond this, is a realm of truthful liberty: in thought and dream, fantasy and imagination; in souvenir, aptitude, and genius—all possible manner of difference, topped with freedom of soul to do and be, and freedom of thought to give to a earth and build into it, all wealth of inborn individuality. Each effort to stop this liberty of being is a blow at democracy—that existent commonwealth which is reservoir and opportunity . . . There tin can be no perfect commonwealth curtailed by color, race, or poverty. But with all we accomplish all, fifty-fifty Peace."

West. E. B. Du Bois in The Globe and Africa: An Inquiry into the Part Which Africa Has Played in World History (Oxford Academy Printing, 2007 [1947]), 165.
Chosen by Phillip Sinitiere, Professor of History at the College of Biblical Studies, Houston, TX and 2019 Du Bois Center Postal service-Doctoral Boyfriend

"Perhaps even higher than strength and art loom human sympathy and sacrifice as characteristic of Negro womanhood"

W. Eastward. B. Du Bois in The Damnation of Women (1920)
Chosen by Sarah Holm Tanzi, 2019 Du Bois Center Post-Doctoral Fellow

 Viewing anniversary parade from balcony of ancient Royal Palace in Peking, Oct. 1, 1962.

"Nations reel and stagger on their way; they brand hideous mistakes; they commit frightful wrongs; they do nifty and beautiful things. And shall nosotros not best guide humanity by telling the truth almost all this, so far as the truth is attestable?"

West. East. B. Du Boisin Black Reconstruction in America (1935)
Chosen by Eliza Araújo, Visiting Scholar at UMass AFROAm Department, Ph.D pupil at Universidade Federal da Paraíba, and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Fellow

"Simply what of Blackness women?… I nigh sincerely doubt if any other race of women could have brought its fineness up through then devilish a burn."

W. E. B. Du Bois
Called by Venus Green, Doctoral student in Sociology at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Fellow

"Beneath the Veil lay right and wrong, vengeance and love, and sometimes throwing aside the veil, a soul of sugariness Dazzler and Truth stood revealed."

W. East. B. Du Bois in Black Reconstruction in America (1935)
Chosen by Aaron Yates, Doctoral student in Folklore at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Fellow

"I believe in pride of race and lineage and self; in pride of self and so deep as to scorn injustice to other selves."

West. E. B. Du Bois
Chosen past Samantha Davis, Doctoral student in Political Science at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Fellow

Portrait of Due west. Eastward. B. Du Bois seated in study holding newspaper.

"The true significance of slavery in the United States to the whole social evolution of America lay in the ultimate relation of slaves to republic. What were to exist the limits of democratic control in the U.s.a.? If all labor, black likewise every bit white, became free – were given schools and the right to vote – what control could or should be prepare to the ability and action of these laborers? Was the dominion of the mass of Americans to exist unlimited, and the correct to rule extended to all men regardless of race and color, or if not, what power of dictatorship and control; and how would belongings and privilege be protected? This was the great and primary question which was in the minds of the men who wrote the Constitution of the United states and continued in the minds of thinkers downwards through the slavery controversy. It still remains with the earth as the problem of commonwealth expands and touches all races and nations."

Due west. E. B. Du Boisin Black Reconstruction in America (1935)
Chosen by Mike Jirik, Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of History at UMass and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Boyfriend

Rule-post-obit, legal precedence, and political consistency are not more important than right, justice and plain common-sense.

W. Eastward. B. Du Bois in Black Reconstruction (1935)

"And herein lies the tragedy of the historic period: not that men are poor, –all men know something of poverty; not that men are wicked, –who is good? non that men are ignorant, –what is Truth? Nay, but that men know so little of men."

Westward. E. B. Du Bois in The Souls of Black Folk(1903)
Called by Stacie Klinowski, Doctoral educatee in the English Department at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Boyfriend

"Now is the accustomed time, non tomorrow, not some more convenient season. It is today that our best work tin can exist done and non some future day or future year."

Westward. E. B. Du Bois
Chosen past Heather Brinn, Ph.D Candidate in the History Department at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Fellow

Due west. East. B. Du Bois in his office belongings the start issue of The Crisis.

"The return from your work must be the satisfaction which that piece of work brings y'all and the world'due south demand of that piece of work. With this, life is sky, or as near sky as yous can become."

Due west. E. B. Du Bois
Chosen by Khaleelah Harris, Master of Divinity student at Yale Divinity School and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Beau

"But ane thing is sure and that is the fact that since the fifteenth century these ancestors of mine and their other descendants have had a common history; accept suffered a common disaster and accept one long memory. The bodily ties of heritage between the individuals of this group, vary with the ancestors that they have in mutual and many others: Europeans and Semites, perhaps Mongolians, certainly American Indians. But the physical bond is least and the badge of colour relatively unimportant save as a bluecoat; the real essence of this kinship is its social heritage of slavery; the discrimination and insult; and this heritage binds together not simply the children of Africa, just extends through xanthous Asia and into the South Seas. It is this unity that draws me to Africa."

Due west. E. B. Du Bois in Dusk of Dawn(1940)
Chosen past Swati Birla, Historical Sociologist at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Heart Graduate Fellow

"Crucified on the vast bicycle of time, I flew round and circular with the Zeitgeist, waving my pen and lifting faint voices to explain, expound and exhort; to meet, foresee and prophesy, to the few who could or would listen."

W. E. B. Du Bois
Chosen past Jingjing Zhang, Visiting Scholar in W.Eastward.B Department of Afro-American Studies at UMass Amherst and 2019 Du Bois Center Graduate Swain