It may be the year of Malcolm X, but the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is holding his own in the hearts of young African Americans whose outlook is increasingly Afrocentric.
At Marcus Book Store on Martin Luther King Jr. Way here, there has been a run on Malcolm X books all year. But books by and about King, with his enduring call for nonviolence, gather no dust."They sell very well all year long," said book store manager Blanche Richardson, "but particularly during this time of the year when schools and institutions are looking for materials to teach King and the civil rights movement."
But with the hype of a Spike Lee-produced movie and a fashion fad, Malcolm X has become the new hero for a young generation of increasingly Afrocentric African Americans.
Books on King sell but "not as fast as books on Malcolm with young people," said Richardson.
King, who would have been 64 years old Friday, was shot and killed as he stood on a motel balcony in Memphis 25 years ago. His birthday has been celebrated as a federal holiday on the third Monday in January since 1986.
While there is no such holiday for Malcolm X - who took the name El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz after a pilgrimage to Mecca - in recent years he has captured the imagination of African Americans born after the Pan-Africanist's death in 1965.
"Youth are impressed by Malcolm," said Terence Elliott, an instructor at the Oakland Street Academy, an alternative high school.
"They relate to (his call for change) `by any means necessary' but don't relate to the end of his life. They are not disconnecting with Martin. Martin is the foundation of our community - the Baptist church," he said.
"In building up Malcolm, they are not putting down Martin."
Elliott, like Prisca Spates and Tyree Jones, recently discussed King and Malcom X at the Marcus Book Store.
"As young people embrace Malcolm, I hope they are picking up books and reading," said Jones, 32, a San Francisco attorney. "People are embracing him on the surface - the antagonism, the confrontational approach. They understand King's nonviolence as weaker. What they don't realize is nonviolence was still confrontational."
King and Malcolm often are painted as having opposing philosophies of the race problem in the United States. However, scholars say that while the two men differed in approach early in the civil rights movement, they began moving toward each other before Malcolm X's death in 1965.
Despite posthumous revelations about extramarital affairs and plagiarism, King has been held up as a role model more than any other 20th-century black leader.
"It serves the interest of those in power, who are threatened by what they perceive of black folks, to divide and conquer," said actor Ossie Davis in a telephone interview.
"The power structure was comfortable with Dr. King. They appreciated greatly Dr. King's nonviolence philosophy because it means to them they'll be safe. No one's going to hurt me. Malcolm made them uncomfortable."
Davis delivered the eulogy at Malcolm's funeral in 1965.
Young black men particularly identify with Malcolm X's tough rhetoric and the fact that he evolved from street life and prison to become a leader.
Prisca Spates, a 25-year-old black woman with a degree in economics, said her view of King and Malcolm had come only after a "rude awakening" about racism in recent years.
"I was conditioned to think that white people were smarter than me," she said. "That awakening caused me to go in search of my history, in search of black people."
Spates said the two Oakland high schools she attended taught neither King nor Malcolm X.
"Malcolm X seems like a much more powerful person," said Spates, who took black studies courses at Long Beach State and has read books by and about both black leaders.
"He was into the black community, black freedom. King came from a religious tip. He had the most impact on all people. Malcolm X affected more black people."
San Francisco businessman James Jefferson said he worries that young people may prefer idolizing rappers and athletes instead of King and Malcolm.
"What's most distressing to me is how young people don't relate in a significant way to either" of the two slain black leaders. "They barely know King or Malcolm. They don't get excited about them like we do. It's because young people in today's society identify with entertainers and sports heroes and not visionary men."
Jefferson argued that in King's and Malcolm's heyday, the civil rights of black people were different.
"Basic access to public facilities were a preoccupation with everybody. Now, we have some level of social assimilation. So young people have no interest in Malcolm or Martin or in Jesse (Jackson) or Louis (Farrakhan)."