Famous Movement a to z

Syed Ahmed Khan was an Indian educator, politician and Islamic reformer whose work inspired a new generation of Muslims and pioneered the revival of Indian Islam in the late 19th century.

Ciro Alegria was a Peruvian novelist who wrote about the struggles of the Peruvian Indians, and whose militant pro-Indian activism led to his arrest and exile.

Yasser Arafat was chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization from 1969 until his death in 2004, a tumultuous period in which clashes with neighboring Israel were prevalent.

Antonin Artaud was a French actor, costume designer and writer who revolutionized drama with his idea of a Theater of Cruelty.

Joan Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter and activist who is best known for her distinctive voice and for her role in popularizing the music of Bob Dylan.

Civil rights activist Ella Baker worked with the NAACP, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

Social activist and pacifist Emily Greene Balch won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1946 for being a lifetime advocate of the persecuted and oppressed.

Imamu Amiri Baraka is an African-American poet and scholar. He has served as professor emeritus of Africana Studies at the State Unversity of New York at Stony Brook.

Jean-Paul Belmondo is a French actor best known for starring in Jean-Luc Godard's Breathless.

Thomas Hart Benton was an esteemed 20th century painter and muralist renowned for works like “America Today” and “Persephone.”

Mary McLeod Bethune was an educator and activist, serving as president of the National Association of Colored Women and founding the National Council of Negro Women.

Steve Biko spearheaded the Black Consciousness Movement in South Africa. He died in 1977, from injuries sustained while in police custody.

American poet and activist Robert Bly is best known for writing Iron John: A Book About Men which is credited for starting the Mythopoetic men's movement.

Simón Bolívar was a Venezuelan military leader who was instrumental in the revolutions against the Spanish empire.

Subhas Chandra Bose was a 20th century organizational and military leader who fought for India’s freedom from British rule.

Jim Bowie was a fighter in Texas Revolution who died during the defense of the Alamo. He became an American folk hero and the "Bowie Knife" is named after him.

Ruby Bridges was the first African-American child to attend an all-white public elementary school in the American South.

Dennis Brutus was a poet whose works center on his sufferings and those of his fellow blacks in South Africa.

Stokely Carmichael was a Trinidadian-American political activist, best known as the leader of the civil rights group SNCC in the 1960s.

Venustiano Carranza was a revolutionary during Mexico's civil war and became the Mexican Republic's first president in 1917.

Hugo Chávez served as president of Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013. During his presidency, he sold oil to Cuba and resisted efforts to stop narcotic trafficking in Columbia, and subsequently strained relations with the United States.

Septima Poinsette Clark was a pioneering educator and activist who championed teacher’s rights with organizations like the NAACP.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet of the Romantic Movement, best known for his allegorical sea-faring poem, "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner."

Henry Cowell was an American pianist and experimental composer whose music influenced John Cage.

Quentin Crisp became a gay icon in the 1970s after publication of his memoir, The Naked Civil Servant, describing his life in homophobic British Society.

Aimé Césaire was a cofounder (with Léopold Sédar Senghor) of Negritude, an influential movement to restore the cultural identity of black Africans.

Post-Impressionist French painter Paul Cézanne is best known for his incredibly varied painting style which greatly affected 20th century abstract art.

Ossie Davis was an American actor, writer, social activist and humanitarian. He often performed with wife Ruby Dee in plays, in film and on television.

Dorothy Day was an activist who worked for such social causes as pacifism and women’s suffrage through the prism of the Catholic Church.

Jean-Jacques Dessalines was a military leader who worked with Toussaint l'Ouverture and gave the country of Haiti its name.

Dorothea Dix was an educator and social reformer whose devotion to the welfare of the mentally ill led to widespread international reforms.

Hilda Doolittle (or H.D.) was a poet of the avant-garde Imagist movement and was openly bisexual.

Stephen A. Douglas was a 19th century U.S. senator known for the Freeport Doctrine and who ran for president against Abraham Lincoln.

Richard Dreyfuss is an American actor known for his roles in Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, American Graffiti and The Goodbye Girl.

Andrea Dworkin was an American feminist and author, an outspoken critic of sexual politics, particularly of the victimizing effects of pornography on women.

Shirin Ebadi is an Iranian lawyer and human-rights activist. She was the first female judge in Iran, and won the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize.

Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American Transcendentalist poet, philosopher and essayist during the 19th century. One of his best-known essays is "Self-Reliance.”

Author and activist Myrlie Evers-Williams was the wife of slain civil rights activist Medgar Evers, and served as chair of the NAACP 1995–1998.

Henry Fielding was an English writer and justice of the peace who crafted novels like Tom Jones and Amelia.

Jane Fonda is an American actress best known for her acting career, political activism and aerobic-exercise videos. The daughter of acclaimed actor Henry Fonda, the actress has won two Oscars.

Writer, feminist and women's rights activist Betty Friedan wrote The Feminine Mystique (1963) and co-founded the National Organization for Women.

Federico García Lorca is considered one of Spain's greatest poets and dramatists. One of his most successful poetry collections was The Gypsy Ballads.

Bob Geldof is best known as the singer of the band the Boomtown Rats and for his political activism, particularly anti-poverty efforts in Africa.

The poems of Nikki Giovanni helped to define the African American voice of the 1960s, '70s and beyond. She was also a major force in the Black Arts movement.

Leon Golub was an American painter who was both horrified and inspired by the Vietnam War.

Minister and lecturer Sylvester Graham was a major figure of the 19th century dietary reform movement and was also known as the person behind Graham crackers.

Journalist Arthur Griffith was a founder of the Irish nationalist movement (Sinn Féin) and briefly served as President of the Irish Republic in 1922.

Fannie Lou Hamer was a civil rights activists who helped African Americans register to vote and who cofounded the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party.

Art Hanes was mayor of Birmingham, Alabama, between 1961 and 1963. He actively opposed racial integration.

Tom Hayden is a political activist and writer who served in the California State Assembly and State Senate. He is also the former husband of actress Jane Fonda.

Dorothy Height was a civil rights and women's rights activist focused primarily on improving the circumstances of and opportunities for African-American women.

Journalist Theodor Herzl responded to the anti-Semitism he witnessed while covering the Dreyfus Affair by starting the World Zionist Organization.

Wild Bill Hickok was an American frontiersman, army scout and lawman who helped bring order to the frontier West.

Heinrich Himmler was commander of Hitler's Schutzstaffel, and later of the Gestapo in Nazi Germany. After World War II, he committed suicide to escape capture.

Charles H. Houston was an attorney and vice-dean who worked in important civil rights cases, ultimately helping to end Jim Crow laws.

Statesman Samuel Houston was a key political figure in the creation of the state of Texas. He was elected the first president of the Republic of Texas in 1836.

Dolores Huerta is an activist and labor leader who co-founded what would become the United Farm Workers.

Hubert H. Humphrey was an assistant majority leader of the Senate who became the 38th U.S. vice president under Lyndon B. Johnson.

Anne Hutchinson was a Puritan woman who spread her own interpretations of the Bible, leading to the Antinomian Controversy in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Roy Innis is an American Civil Rights Activist best known as the former National Chairman of Congress of Racial Equality (CORE).

Jesse Jackson Jr. is the son of the famous Reverend Jesse Jackson. He served as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1995 to 2012.

20th century recording artist Mahalia Jackson, known as the Queen of Gospel, is revered as one of the greatest musical figures in U.S. history.

Samuel L. Jackson is known as one of the hardest-working Hollywood actors. In 2011, he was named the highest-grossing actor of all time.

Janet Jagan co-founded the People's Progressive Party. She was the first woman to become prime minister of Guyana and was also Guyana’s first female president.

In 1951, Barbara Johns led her fellow students in a walkout to protest school segregation. She then started a lawsuit that became part of Brown v. Board of Ed.

James Weldon Johnson was an African-American writer, politician, educator and lawyer. He was also an early civil rights activist and leader of the NAACP.

Mary Harris Jones (aka "Mother Jones") was a union activist. She founded the Social Democratic Party, and helped establish the Industrial Workers of the World.

Paul Kagame is a Rwandan military leader and politician who is best known for defeating Hutu extremist forces to end the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Russian-born painter Wassily Kandinsky is credited as a leader in avant-garde art as one of the founders of pure abstraction in painting in the early 20th century.

Robert Kennedy was Attorney General during his brother JFK's administration. He later served as a U.S. Senator and was assassinated during his run for the presidency.