Black History Studies presents the Author Talk and Book Launch of ‘Huey P. Newton: I am We’ by Assistant Professor at New York University Delio Vasquez.
Delio Vasquez will be in London presenting material from his new book, Huey P. Newton: I am We, published with Polity Press. It is an intellectual biography of the principal co-founder and ‘chief theoretician’ of the Black Panther Party, only the second scholarly book about him.
Huey P. Newton was called many things in his time: revolutionary, genius, criminal, even the most surveilled human being in world history. Yet, little of the truth about him is known today due to persistent distortions of his legacy as co-founder of the Black Panther Party.
In this much-needed intellectual history, Delio Vásquez establishes Newton as a true philosopher. Newton developed innovative theories for how the most oppressed could spearhead revolutionary change in a rapidly developing technological society. Inspired by his ideas, the Panthers forged alliances with Black student unions and street gangs, Hollywood elites and poor whites, the gay liberation movement and Third World nations.
Newton left behind dozens of unpublished manuscripts analysing politics, feminist thought, education, philosophy, evolutionary biology, and theology – texts presented here for the first time. Vásquez also puts into proper perspective Newton’s late descent into addiction and madness – a direct effect of US government techniques of cognitive war that targeted his body and mind in ways that remain all too relevant today.
Biography:
Delio Vásquez is a scholar of political theory, philosophy, Black Studies, and social movement history. He holds a PhD in the History of Consciousness from the University of California Santa Cruz, with concentrations in Politics and Feminist Studies, an MA in Linguistics from the City University of New York Graduate Center, and a BA in English Literature from the University of Chicago. He has also held a postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at American University, taught with the San Quentin Prison University Project at Mount Tamalpais College, and he currently teaches with NYU’s Prison Education Program at Wallkill Correctional Facility.
His research combines modern political theory, Black studies, and decolonial thought to examine how our modern idea of the criminal was constructed and developed through colonial racial capitalism, how it has been contested by 20th century social movements, and how it has affected our capacity under modernity to empathize with the experiences and suffering of the poor.
This event will take place on Friday 14 August 2026 from 18:30 to 20:30.
The event will be held at The Black Cultural Centre Islington, 16–18 Hornsey Road, N7 7BT. Approx 5 mins walk from Holloway Road (Piccadilly Line) tube station. Free on street parking.
Food and drinks will be on sale.
Admission is FREE but donations will be welcome to support the work we do.
Book your FREE ticket here https://tinyurl.com/4rt6e3mw