A letter from Norfolk Prison Colony shows Malcolm writing as Malcolm X and discussing Islam, family, and his changing sense of self. The X represented an ancestral name erased by enslavement, rather than a specific African surname he could recover from records. This private correspondence gives a dated trace of identity formation before the public ministry for which he later became known.
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What did the X in Malcolm X signify in his early correspondence?
The X in Malcolm X was a specific African surname recovered from a family archive.
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Explanation
It represented the ancestral name erased through enslavement, not a documented recovered name.