In recent years, attacks on wokeness have undermined the scope and methods of history education in U.S. American schools and colleges. Current critiques by conservatives that wokeness curtails American freedom ignores the significance of wokeness in the struggle for Black freedom. This article historicizes ‘woke,’ puts the term into context and elucidates its meaning and significance for the fight against inequality and discrimination in the United States. The article does not offer a comprehensive history of ‘woke,’ but follows individual traces of the term’s use, from references in 1930s folk music to the racism of the Southern criminal justice system, to labour movement rhetoric and policies in West Virginia in the 1940s, and Martin Luther King’s speech at Oberlin College at the height of the civil rights movement in 1965.