AThe Annals

Martin Luther King Jr.

1929 – 1968 · United States · Peace, Philosophy, Literature

Nobel Peace Prize, 1964

Letter from Birmingham Jail and a movement that rewrote American law.

Index entry

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Talks and interviews

Continuity of ideas

Who shaped Martin Luther King Jr., and who they shaped

Inherited from2

  • Mahatma Gandhi

    1869 – 1948 · Peace, Philosophy

    King's Montgomery method is Gandhian nonviolence adapted to American segregation.

  • W. E. B. Du Bois

    1868 – 1963 · Philosophy, History

    The double-consciousness diagnosis frames King's account of American moral division.

Passed the work to2

  • James Baldwin

    1924 – 1987 · Literature

    Their argument over patience and rage defined the movement's moral vocabulary.

  • Leymah Gbowee

    1972 · Peace

    Gbowee's mass nonviolent women's action follows the King–Gandhi repertoire.

Sources and references

Numbered markers in the text above point to the entries below. Each links to a primary document, archival collection or scholarly reference where the claim about Martin Luther King Jr. can be checked.

  1. 1.
    Nobel Prize record — Nobel Peace Prize, 1964

    The Nobel Foundation · Primary source

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Benjamin Franklin

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Designed American public credit, the national bank and industrial policy.

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Phineas Quimby

1802 – 1866

Clockmaker turned mental healer whose notebooks seeded the entire New Thought movement.

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