Joan baez activist biography of martin luther

As her confidence grew, Baez began performing impromptu concerts in her school lunchroom, and her social standing changed from self-conscious outsider to popular entertainer.

It was also during this era that she attended a three-day conference on world issues with the American Friends Service Committee, the Quakers' social-action wing. She was inspired in a way she never had been, and soon found herself speaking forcefully before groups and being regarded as a leader.

Joan baez activist biography of martin luther king

The conference's main speaker was a year-old black preacher named Martin Luther King, Jr. Baez was exhilarated by King and his speech, which gave her a sense that she was "going somewhere" with her pacifism, she wrote in her autobiography, And a Voice to Sing With.

The two would remain close and often protested together in the struggle for civil rights. It was also through the Quakers that she met Ira Sandperl, who would become her friend and political and spiritual mentor