Reunion 005:Gender and Power in Family Relationships with Ula Y. Taylor

In the 1930s, while her husband, Elijah Muhammad, was imprisoned, Clara Poole (later known as Clara Muhammad) quietly stepped into leadership. She wasn’t given a title. She didn’t stand at a pulpit. But she taught the children, organized the women, and held the Nation of Islam together. In a movement that promised both protection and patriarchy, Clara found a way to lead from within. Her story is not unique. Across the early years of the Nation of Islam, Black women built schools, sustained families, and shaped theology, often behind the scenes, always at the center. They navigated a religious world that asked them to submit, even as it relied on their strength. In The Promise of Patriarchy, historian Ula Y. Taylor uncovers the lives of these women, showing how they negotiated faith, family, and gendered expectations to shape a movement that would transform Black religious and political life in America. Today, Ula joins us to talk about how power moves through families, how women lead in spaces that don’t always recognize their leadership, and how history remembers (or forgets) them.