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

Title page of The Refugee: or the Narrative of Fugitive Slaves in Canada

Harriet Tubman’s reflection in The Refugee

1856

Read Tubman’s memories of enslavement and freedom in her own words.

Primary Source

Map of the East Coast and Midwest of the United States with the size of the free Black population in each state and territory in 1800 (in blue) and 1830 (in red), with a bar chart at left showing the change in free Black population from 1790 to 1860

Free African American Population, 19th Century

by Michael Siegel

Explore the change in free Black populations over time across the North, South, and Midwest.

Thematic Map

A storefront window with a sign for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

1964 SNCC Position Paper on Women in the Movement

by Michelle Moravec

Explore the origins of this SNCC memo and its authorship.

Essay

Fannie Lou Hamer, a Black woman, speaking while wearing a floral-patterned dress.

Black Women’s Leadership and Organizing in the Civil Rights Movement

by Keisha N. Blain

Explore the civil rights leadership of JoAnn Robinson, Ella Baker, and Fannie Lou Hamer.

Essay

Bert Williams, a Black man, wearing a black coat and white collar.

Representation on the Stage, Screen, and Airwaves

by Kenya Davis-Hayes

Explore the history of Black performance from Reconstruction through the 1960s.

Essay

Detail from an 1805 broadside showing restraining devices used on enslaved peoples

Global Africans and Transatlantic Slaving to the United States

by Kwasi Konadu

Explore the origins of and predecessors to the transatlantic slave trade.

Essay

Map of the Kongo River.

Afonso and the Slave Trade

by John K. Thornton

Explore the origins and evolution of the slave trade in Kongo and Portugal.

Essay

A color print of Toussaint L'Ouverture, a Black soldier, wearing a Haitian cavalry uniform (black hat with a gold frill and white flower, blue jacket with gold trim and epaulets, white pants, and black boots) holding a sword atop a brown horse with a red and gold saddle.

Haiti and the Age of Abolition

by Marlene L. Daut

Understand the legacy of the Haitian Revolution and its global impact.

Essay

A photocopied cover of a curriculum catalog. At right, a black panther pouncing below the text "Black Studies Curriculum."

Black Studies: Its Origin and Place in the Twenty-First Century

by Abul Pitre

Develop an understanding of the birth and evolution of African American Studies, Black Studies, and other adjacent fields.

Essay

Front page of a newspaper, The Africo-American Presbyterian

African American Naming Conventions

by Claude A. Clegg III

Understand changes in nomenclature in the African diaspora.

Essay

Map of North America with routes on the Underground Railroad; The legend says that free states and territories are in green and slave states and territories are in tan. Underground railroad routes are in red, with arrows pointing north, west, and (from Georgia), south. The data is from the Atlas of African-American History and Politics.

The Underground Railroad in the Eighteenth Century

by Michael Siegel

Visualize the Underground Railroad in its earliest days through this map.

Thematic Map

Map of North America with routes on the Underground Railroad.

The Underground Railroad in the Nineteenth Century

by Michael Siegel and Rutgers Cartography

Visualize the Underground Railroad in the antebellum US through this map.

Thematic Map