Celebrated public intellectual and activist Cornel West, in conversation with Christa Buschendorf, offers an unflinching look at African Americans leaders of the 19th and 20th century and their visionary legacies. The discussion provides a fresh perspective on revolutionary African American leaders: Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. Du Bois, Martin Luther King, Jr., Ella Baker, Malcolm X, and Ida B. Wells-Barnett. West examines what these black leaders meant to the people of their eras, how their legacies are felt today, and what present-day leaders and activists, including West himself, have learned from these men and women.