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In 1999, the African American conservative writer and intellectual Shelby Steele wrote of the "animus, demonization, misunderstanding, and flat-out, undifferentiated contemptâ[euro] that is so often directed at black conservatives in the United States. In what has become a seminal essay for black conservatives, Steele's "The Loneliness of the 'Black Conservative',â[euro] published in the Hoover Digest, attempted to explain the complexities of black conservatism. Steele, like other prominent black conservatives - such as Thomas Sowell, Clarence Thomas, Glenn Loury, Walter Williams, Robert Woodson, John McWhorter, Jay Parker, and Anne Wortham - have attracted a small but dedicated following among conservative African Americans, many of whom complain that their "blacknessâ[euro] is often questioned, and their "Negro cardâ[euro] revoked, for their conservative political views.
The history of black conservativism - especially its modern manifestations - has attracted surprisingly little scholarly analysis; indeed, the scholarship that does...