SUMMER 2003

This is an introductory survey class in African American history. Much of the focus will be on slavery and the emergence of white supremacy and white institutionalized racism. The course will briefly survey the African ancestral past, and the emergence of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. We will look closely at the formative experience of Virginia, Maryland and North Carolina in the colonial period; the American evolution; and the antebellum period. We will also look at the role of cultural, economic and epidemiological factors that contributed to the emergence of chattel slavery and Anglo-American racism. We will also look at resistance, the slave revolts and conspiracies, and the impact of slavery on both men and women.

The major readings will be:

Selections from "Columbus Special Issue"
Vincent Harding, There Is A River
Winthrop Jordan, The White Man's Burden
David Blight, editor, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of A Slave Girl
Walter Johnson, Soul By Soul

LECTURE LINKS BELOW