Abstract

In October of 1967, a group of top African-American student-athletes from San Jose State University, along with their sociology Professor, Harry Edwards, established the “Olympic Project for Human Rights” (OPHR(, a movement that aspired to use the sporting arena to protest racial injustices and the mistreatment of African Americans in the United States, while promoting social change. Tracing the movement’s year-long campaign to orchestrate an African American boycott of the upcoming 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, this article examines the movement’s primary attempt to galvanize African American student-athletes into a cohesive collective working together to create social change thru sports, the different strategies it used to execute its plans, and the fierce public backlash it faced during its year-long existence. Eventually failing to execute its boycott plan, the OPHR is mostly remembered by the powerful image of two of its members, Tommie Smith and John Carlos, raising their fists in the air while on the winners’ podium as the national anthem played during the Mexico City Olympics. Although a powerful demonstration of racial pride, the “black power salute” and its fallout represent a transition from a centralized, collective form of action before the Olympics, to an individualistic, symbolic form of protest during it. It easily diverted public attention away from the OPHR’s goal to highlight the plight of African Americans, towards a futile discussion over Smith and Carlos’ explosion from the games. Furthermore, the popular historical narrative which overstatesthe protest’s historical importance, vastly ignores its damaging effects that led to the OPHR’s quick demise right after the Olympics, leaving activism out of the sporting arena for decades, while maintaining the existing power structure in American sports intact.