African Americans: A Concise History, Combined Volume (Chapters 1-23 and Epilogue)

Since Du Bois's time our understanding of both African-American and American history has been complicated and enriched by a growing appreciation of the role of class and gender in shaping human societies. We are also increasingly aware of the complexity of racial experiences in American history. Even in times of great racial polarity some white people have empathized with black people and some black people have identified with white interests.

It is in light of these insights that African Americans: A Concise History tells its story. That story begins in Africa, where the people who were to become African Americans began their long, turbulent, and difficult journey, a journey marked by sustained suffering as well as perseverance, bravery, and achievement. It includes the rich culture—at once splendidly distinctive and tightly intertwined with a broader American culture—that African Americans have nurtured throughout their history. And it includes the many-faceted quest for freedom in which African Americans have sought to counter whiteoppression and racism with the egalitarian spirit of the Declaration of Independence that American society professes to embody.

Nurtured by black historian Carter G. Woodson during the early decades of the twentieth century, African-American history has blossomed as a field of study since the 1950s. Books and articles have appeared on almost every facet of black life. This book, based on The African-American Odyssey, is about one-third the length of its parent text, and is designed for one-semester courses or for instructors who want a concise narrative that can be supplemented with more specialized readings. African Americans may also serve as a supplementary text in American history survey courses. It has benefited from constructive criticism provided by instructors across the United States who have adopted The African-American Odyssey. African Americans draws on recent research to present black history in a clear and direct manner, within a broad social, cultural, and political framework. It also provides thorough coverage of African-American women as active builders of black culture.

African Americans balances accounts of the actions of African-American leaders with investigations of the lives of the ordinary men and women in black communities. This community focus helps make this a history of a people rather than an account of a few extraordinary individuals. Yet the book does not neglect important political and religious leaders, intellectuals, entrepreneurs, and entertainers. And it provides extensive coverage of African-American art, literature, and music.

African-American history started in Africa, and this narrative begins with an account of life on that continent from earliest times to the sixteenth century and the beginning of the forced migration of millions of Africans to the Americas. Succeeding chapters present the struggle of black people to maintain their humanity during the slave trade and slavery in North America.

The coming of the American Revolution during the 1770s initiated a pattern of black struggle for racial justice in which periods of optimism alternated with times of repression. Several chapters analyze the building of black community institutions, the antislavery movement, the efforts of black people to make the Civil War a war for emancipation, their struggle for equal rights as citizens during Reconstruction, and the strong opposition these efforts faced. There is also substantial coverage of African-American military service, from the War for Independence through American wars of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

During the late nineteenth century and much of the twentieth century, racial segregation and racially motivated violence that relegated African Americans to second-class citizenship provoked despair, but also inspired resistance and commitment to change. Chapters on the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries cover the great migration from the cotton fields of the South to the North and West, black nationalism, and the Harlem Renaissance. Chapters on the 1930s and 1940s—the beginning of a period of revolutionary change for African Americans—tell of the economic devastation and political turmoil caused by the Great Depression, the growing influence of black culture in America, the racial tensions caused by black participation in World War II, and the dawning of the civil rights movement.

The final chapters tell the story of African Americans during the second half of the twentieth century. They relate the successes of the civil rights movement at its peak during the 1950s and 1960s and the efforts of African Americans to build on those successes during the more conservative 1970s and 1980s. Finally, there are portrayals of black life during the concluding decade of the twentieth century and of the continuing impact of African Americans on life in the United States.

In all, African Americans tells a compelling story of survival, struggle, and triumph over adversity. It will leave students with an appreciation of the central place of black people and black culture in this country and a better understanding of both African-American and American history.

Special Features

Several special features and pedagogical tools within African Americans are designed to reinforce the narrative and help students grasp key issues.

• Brief chronologies throughout the narrative provide students with a snapshot of the temporal relationship among significant events.
• End-of-chapter timelines establish a chronological context for events in African-American history by juxtaposing them with events in American history and in the rest of the world.
• Review questions encourage students to analyze the material they have read and to explore alternative perspectives.
• Recommended reading and additional bibliography lists direct students to more information about the subject of each chapter.
• Maps, charts, and graphs help students visualize the geographical context of events and grasp significant trends.
• Illustrations, tied to the text with informative captions, provide a visual link to the African-American past.
• Color inserts provide a sample of the richness of the folk and fine art African Americans have produced throughout their history.
• The appendix includes documents central to the history of African Americans.

Supplementary Instructional Materials

The supplements that accompany African Americans provide instructors and students with resources that combine sound scholarship, engaging content, and a variety of pedagogical tools to enrich the classroom experience and students' understanding of African-American history.

Instructor's Manual with Test-Item File. The Instructor's Manual with Test-Item File /provides summaries, outlines, learning objectives, lecture and discussion topics for each chapter. Test materials include multiple choice, essay, identification and short-answer, chronology, and map questions.

Practice Tests (Volumes I and II). This free student study aid includes a summary for each chapter, reviews key points and concepts, and provides multiple choice, essay, chronology, and map questions.

Documents Set (Volumes I and II). The Documents Set supplements the text with additional primary and secondary source material covering the social, cultural, and political aspects of African-American history. Each reading includes a short historical summary and several review questions.

Prentice Hall and Penguin Bundle Program. Prentice Hall and Penguin are pleased to provide adopters of African Americans with an opportunity to receive significant discounts when orders for African Americans are bundled together with Penguin titles in American history, such as The Interesting Narrative by Olaudah Equiano, The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, and Why We Can't Wait by Martin Luther King Jr.

Prentice Hall's new Research Navigator^™ helps your students make the most of their research time. From finding the right articles and journals, to citing sources, drafting and writing effective papers, and completing research assignments, Research Navigator^™ simplifies and streamlines the entire process.

Complete with extensive help on the research process and three exclusive databases full of relevant and reliable source material including EBSCO's ContentSelect Academic Journal Database, The New York Times Search by Subject Archive, and Best of the Web Link Library, Research Navigator^™ is the one-stop research solution for your students.

Research Navigator^™ is FREE when packaged with African Americans. Contact your local sales representative for more details or take a tour on the web at our site.

History Central. Prentice Hall is pleased to provide instructors online support resources for their courses in African-American history. Located at our site, History Central contains PowerPoint^— slides, lecture notes, maps, documents, and visuals. Contact your local Prentice Hall representative for details.