Those Who Know Don't Say: The Nation of Islam, the Black Freedom Movement, and the Carceral State by Garrett Felber is a revisionist history in its strict sense. For years, scholars have viewed the Nation of Islam as apolitical. The NOI wanted a separate state, and therefore refused to participate in political or social action.
Felber seeks to show that this is not true; the NOI was involved in prison reform almost from its inception. Felber has a narrow goal, the NOI and its relationship with the "carceral" state. He steers clear of defining the NOI religiously, which is my area of interest. Felber allows the NOI to self-define as Muslim. He explains that denying the NOI's affiliation to global Islam was long a a part of the “carceral” state’s attempt to rob it of religious legitimacy. Under this rubric, prisons were able to deny NOI inmates religious rights.
This fascinating book shows the NOI in a less Malcom X-centric light. The NOI stands on its own. It is an interesting angle.
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