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Why did Malcolm Little change his last name to X?
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Malcolm X
Prominent figure in the Nation of Islam Malcolm X, 1965.
Malcolm Little changed his surname to "X" as a member of the Nation of Islam. Following the organization's tradition, followers replaced their surnames with an "X" to signify that their original family names had been imposed by white slaveholders and that they had lost their true ancestral identities through slavery.12
By adopting this name, Malcolm X rejected the "slave name" of his past and embraced a new identity rooted in the movement's teachings on Black nationalism and self-identity. He later adopted the name el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz after converting to Sunni Islam following his hajj to Mecca in 1964.123