David and Goliath: Civil Rights Activists and Tricksters (Chapter Six)

(This is part of a chapter by chapter review of David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits and the Art of Battling Giants, a review of the first chapter can be found here)

This chapter deals with the African American Civil Rights struggle, a subject which Gladwell's critics probably don't doubt his ability to write accurately about.  It begins with a photo of a young black man being bitten by a dog leashed to a white police officer.  Gladwell describes the fame the photo has acquired and prompts our sympathy for the young man.  After providing a background for the Civil Rights Struggle, Gladwell unexpectedly shifts into "trickster heroes", especially those within African American culture.  References to trickster tales are peppered throughout the chapter.  We are introduced to Wyatt Walker who worked alongside Martin Luther King and Fred Shuttleworth in desegregating Birmingham.  Since most blacks were afraid to join King, and Birmingham's Commissioner of Public Safety had plenty of empty jail cells, Wyatt figured he had to provoke Connor.  Initially he sent 22 protestors marching which the media overestimated to be 1400.  After hundreds of children filled prison cells, Walker led a new group of children, outmaneuvering the fire trucks.  Bull Connor unleashed his German Shepherds, creating the photo from the beginning of the chapter.  The chapter represents the picture.  It gives background information about the individuals in the picture.  He also refers to minor details of the picture which suggest that the biting isn't as harsh as it seems from an initial glance.  It's subtly suggested that the picture is Wyatt's manifestation of the trickster tales told throughout the chapter.