AP African American Studies Resource Archive | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

Sepia photographic portraits of a man and a woman; the woman is wearing a white shirt with checked trim and an earring; the man is bare-chested, with well-defined musculature. Both have traditional scarification on their cheeks.

“Escrava Mina” and “Escravo Mina”

1864

View two photographs of enslaved people in Brazil.

Primary Source

A map of the southern states of the United States with bar charts for each noting population movement from other states (color-coded).

“African Americans Going South, 1995–2000”

by Michael Siegel and Rutgers Cartography

Visualize a phase of Black migration at the end of the twentieth century.

Thematic Map

A black-and-white photograph of several Black men in army uniforms (dark double-breasted coats, dark gloves, dark hats) standing aboard a ship, rigging visible in the left midground and cargo in the right foreground and midground.

Resistance and Resilience: Black Service in World War I

with Adriane Lentz-Smith

Learn more about African American service in the war to “make the world safe for democracy,” while also dealing with racism at home.

Video

March on Washington Organizing Document

1963

Read instructions for a group of medical professionals ahead of the March on Washington.

Primary Source

A page from a book with the title "The Statues at Large" in large, gothic font.

Legislating Reproduction and Racial Difference

from Women and the American Story, The New York Historical

Take a deep dive into the legal doctrine of partus sequitur ventrem.

Essay

Image of a Benjamin Banneker postal stamp featuring a portrait of Banneker with a smaller, full-body illustration of Banneker with a telescope in the foreground.

African American Scientists

with Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

Learn more about some of the most notable African American scientists and their discoveries, from Benjamin Banneker to Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Video

Scan of NAACP poster listing statistics regarding the 3,436 lynchings that occurred between 1889 and 1922. States "Do you know that the United States is the Only Land on Earth where people are burned at the stake?" Reports that 83 women have been lynched in the United States.

Origins of the Civil Rights Movement

with Anthony J. Badger

Learn more about the start of the Civil Rights movement.

Video

Betye Saar, a Black woman, wearing a white shirt with black streaks, her arms crossed. Prints of her art are in the background behind her.

Black is Beautiful: “Something to Behold ... Something One Could Do”

by Elizabeth Carmel Hamilton

Learn more about the works of Betye Saar, Elizabeth Catlett, and Toni Morrison in the context of Black is Beautiful.

Essay

Mary McLeod Bethune seated at her desk in Bethune-Cookman College.

Mary McLeod Bethune’s Impact

with Noliwe Rooks

Learn about Mary McLeod Bethune’s life, her involvement in politics and civil rights, and her work’s lasting impact.

Video

Hidden History: Jessie McGuire Dent

with Tommie Boudreaux, Samuel Collins III, Diane Henderson, and Faye Williams

Explore McGuire Dent’s role in fighting racial discrimination and organizing the Delta Sigma Theta sorority.

Video

An abstract multicolored mural above a bus depot, with a blue and white bus pulling into the depot in the right foreground.

“Mother Hale’s Garden”

by Shinique Smith

Explore the life and career of an activist and community organizer through this work of public art.

Work of Art

A silhouette head-and-shoulders portrait of Paul Cuffe, above a sailboat and within an octagon with the text "Captain Paul Cuffee, 1812."

The Nineteenth-Century Emigrationist and Anti-Emigrationist Movements

with Nemata Blyden

Explore the key figures, sites, and concepts of both the emigrationist and anti-emigrationist movements.

Video

AP African American Studies Resource Library