This course examines the African-American experience from a multidisciplinary
perspective from 1865 to the present, relying on lectures, selected readings, and
documentaries. We will examine the ways in which African Americans made the
transition from slavery to freedom, and how the American social, economic, and
political landscape was dramatically altered as the antebellum plantation system 
came to an end. We will study the evolution of black political thought as blacks 
began to abandon the politics of accommodation, as advanced by Booker T. 
Washington, in favor of a more militant approach, espoused by W.E.B. DuBois and the 
new “Negro elite.” After exploring the historical significance of the outpouring of 
black literary achievement that came to be known as the “Harlem Renaissance,” we 
will focus on the black experience in the post-World War II era, including a 
discussion of presidential politics and an extensive analysis of the black civil 
rights movement, in which thousands of black and white Americans fought to secure 
basic civil liberties and equal justice for all American citizens. The course will 
conclude with an examination of contemporary African-American culture.

The principal objective of the course is to teach students to think critically for
themselves about the relationships between the past and the present, to learn to ask
questions of the past that enable them to understand the present and mold the 
future,and to become attuned to both the limitations and possibilities of change.  
The course seeks to acquaint students with the ways in which past societies and 
peoples have defined the relationships between community and individual needs and 
goals, and between ethical norms and decision-making.

In general students will be expected to: 

1. read a wide range of primary and secondary sources critically.

2. polish skills in critical thinking, including the ability to recognize the
difference between opinion and evidence, and the ability to evaluate--and support or
refute--arguments effectively.

3. write stylistically appropriate and mature papers and essays using processes that
include discovering ideas and evidence, organizing that material, and revising,
editing, and polishing the finished papers.

Introduction

The Civil War and Freedom

The Promise of Reconstruction

The Failure of Reconstruction

Jack Johnson

Race Riots

World War I

The Great Migration

The Blues

Lynching

Reading

Marcus Garvey

Harlem Renaissance

Ida B. Wells-Barnett and Progressivism

The Black Church

The Great Depression and the New Deal

World War II

Jackie Robinson

Charles Hamilton Houston and the NAACP

Brown v. Topeka Board of Education

Emmett Till

Montgomery and Little Rock

Reading

Sit-ins and Freedom Rides

1963

Freedom Summer and the MFDP

Watts

Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam

The Rise of Black Power and the Black Panther Party

1970s and Black Culture

Hip Hop