African American Studies  

Provides a range of historical and current information on African American history, society and culture. Includes coverage of such topics as: Africa and the Black diaspora; film and television; landmarks; national organizations; population; religion; science and technology; and sports.

Focuses on writers and works published since 1950. The majority of the authors surveyed are African American, but representative African and Caribbean authors are also included.

Illuminates daily life in slave society in America from colonial times to the end of the Civil War. Provides information on the business and regulation of slavery, the plantation way of life, work, family and community, culture and leisure, health and medicine, religion, resistance and rebellion, and slavery and freedom in the North.

This inspirational documentary is about a band of courageous civil-rights activists calling themselves the Freedom Riders. Gaining impressive access to influential figures on both sides of the issue, it chronicles a chapter of American history that stands as an astonishing testament to the accomplishment of youth and what can result from the incredible combination of personal conviction and the courage to organize against all odds.

Based on the work of Dinesh D'Souza, 2016: Obama's America is the highest-grossing conservatively-slanted documentary of all time. It lays out what D'Souza believes Obama would do in a second term as President of the United States. He bases his conclusions on Obama's father's anti-colonialism and on Obama's purported psychological desire to fulfill his father's dream of diminishing the power of Western imperial states. The film is arresting in its presentation and sobering in its conclusions.

Associate editor of the Washington Post and Pulitzer Prize winner David Maraniss tells the story of President Barack Obama's diverse and unique family.

The remarkable celebration of the life and legacy of civil rights advocate and Supreme Court pioneer Thurgood Marshall, the first African American appointed to the nation's highest judicial bench. Filmed before a live audience at the Kennedy Center's Eisenhower Theater, this compelling one-man play written by Peabody Award and Emmy Award winner George Stevens, Jr. and directed by Emmy Award winner Michael Stevens stars the Emmy Award and Tony Award-winning actor Laurence Fishburne.

Swedish television journalists document the early Black power movement in the United States.

Arguably the most important American lawyer of the twentieth century, Thurgood Marshall was on the verge of bringing the landmark suit Brown v. Board of Education before the U.S. Supreme Court when he became embroiled in an explosive case that threatened to change the course of the civil rights movement and cost him his life. In 1949, Florida’s orange industry was booming, built on the backs of cheap Jim Crow labor. To maintain order and profits, they turned to Willis V. McCall, a violent sheriff who ruled Lake County. When a white seventeen-year-old Groveland girl cried rape, McCall was on the trail of four young blacks who dared to envision a future for themselves beyond the citrus groves. By day’s end, the Ku Klux Klan had appeared, bent on lynching the young men who came to be known as “the Groveland Boys.” Drawing on a wealth of never-before-published material, including the FBI’s Groveland case files, as well as access to the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund files, King shines new light on this remarkable civil rights crusader.

In More Than Freedom, award-winning historian Stephen Kantrowitz redefines our understanding of this era by showing that the fight to abolish slavery was part of a broader campaign to establish full citizenship for African Americans. More Than Freedom chronicles this epic struggle through the experiences of black and white activists, including both famous reformers like Frederick Douglass and Charles Sumner and lesser-known but equally important figures. These black freedmen called themselves "colored citizens" and fought to establish themselves in public life by building their own networks and institutions and by fiercely challenging slavery and prejudice. Even though these reformers ultimately failed to remake the nation in the way they hoped, their struggle catalyzed the arrival of Civil War and changed the social and political landscape of the Union forever.

On June 28, 1839, the Spanish slave schooner Amistad set sail on a routine delivery of slaves. After four days at sea, the captive Africans rose up, killed the captain, and seized control of the ship. They attempted to sail to a safe port, but were captured by the U.S. Navy and thrown in jail in Connecticut. Their legal battle for freedom eventually made its way to the Supreme Court, In a landmark ruling, they were freed and finally returned to Africa. The rebellion became one of the best-known events in the history of American slavery. In this powerful and original account, Marcus Rediker reclaims the rebellion for its true proponents: the African rebels who risked death to stake a claim for freedom. Using newly discovered evidence, Rediker reframes the story to show how a small group of courageous men fought and won an epic battle against Spanish and American slaveholders and their governments; and shows how the rebels captured the popular imagination and helped to inspire and build a movement that was part of a great global struggle between slavery and freedom.

Provides a comprehensive overview of the movement of millions of African Americans out of the South during the twentieth century, including the political, social, and economic factors that drove their migration. Includes a narrative overview, biographies, primary sources, chronology, glossary, bibliography, and index"-

In The Price of the Ticket, Harris puts Obama's career in the context of decades of black activism, showing how his election undermined the very movement that made it possible. The path to his presidency began just before passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, when black leaders started discussing strategies to make the most of their new access to the ballot. Some argued that black voters should organize into a cohesive, independent bloc; others urged a more race-neutral approach, working together with other racial minorities as well as like-minded whites; this has been the fundamental divide within black politics ever since. Obama made a point of distancing himself from older race-conscious black leaders, like Jesse Jackson--even though, as Harris shows, he owes much to Jackson's earlier campaigns for the White House. Unquestionably Obama's approach won support among whites, but Harris finds the results troublesome. The social problems targeted by an earlier generation of black politicians--racial disparities in income and education, high incarceration and unemployment rates, rampant HIV in black communities--all persist, yet Obama's election marginalized them. Written by one of America's leading scholars of race and politics, The Price of the Ticket will reshape our understanding of the rise of Barack Obama and the decline of a politics dedicated to challenging racial inequality head on.