sit-ins

1. A form of nonviolent protest, employed during the 1960s in the civil rights movement and later in the movement against the Vietnam War . In a sit-in, demonstrators occupy a place open to the public, such as a racially segregated ( see segregation ) lunch counter or bus station, and then refuse to leave. Sit-ins were designed to provoke arrest and thereby gain attention for the demonstrators' cause.

Notes

The civil rights leader Martin Luther King , Jr., defended such tactics as sit-ins in his “ Letter from Birmingham Jail .”

Example Sentences

DeCrow would come to lead a movement against this practice, suing the Hotel Syracuse in 1969 and calling for protests and sit-ins.

From The Daily Beast

The play was staged a year before African-American students began their sit-ins in North Carolina.

From The Daily Beast

Dr. King noted that marches, even historic marches like the March on Washington, and sit-ins were not the ultimate goal.

From The Daily Beast

Over a dozen churches in Minya alone have been attacked or torched since the violent dispersal of the Islamist sit-ins, they said.

From The Daily Beast

Some of the undocumented immigrants who call themselves DREAMers have held sit-ins in Obama campaign offices.

From The Daily Beast

His suggestion to proprietors of lunch counters undergoing sit-ins was to kick out unwelcome customers.

From Project Gutenberg