AFRICAN AND AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDIES

African American and African Studies Books, Archival
Materials, Digitized Sets, and Microfilm

Bibliographies and Web Site Guides

The African American Experience in Cyberspace: A Resource Guide
to the Best Websites on Black Culture and History.
       Sterling, Va.: Pluto, 2004. Langsam  Ref E185.M49 2004

 

Black American Feminism  http://www.library.ucsb.edu/subjects/blackfeminism/

    This database is a “multidisciplinary subject bibliography of black American feminist writings.”
 

Black Film Research Online http://blackfilm.uchicago.edu/

    This is a comprehensive research guide for materials on Black film and culture.
 

Research and Homework Section, Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton
Online Catalog http://www.cincinnatilibrary.org/resources/

    This section of the Public Library’s online catalog includes access to their
research databases and a section of carefully selected web sites.
 

Voice of the Shuttle: Minority Studies--African American
http://vos.ucsb.edu/browse.asp?id=2721#id154

    This site links to many African American sites on all topics for research and is
a good starting point for web-based browsing.
 
Voice of the Shuttle: African American Literature http://vos.ucsb.edu/browse.asp?id=153
 

Work, Monroe Nathan.  A Bibliography of the Negro in Africa and America.
Reprint of 1928 edition.  New York: Octagon, 1970.  Langsam Ref Z1361.N39W8 1965

    Among the first comprehensive bibliographies relating to African Americans this publication
still has merit for topics of historical interest.
 

Ohio Library Collections
Archives and Rare Books Department, University of Cincinnati Libraries
http://www.archives.uc.edu/
     Less extensive in its holdings of local African American materials than the Cincinnati
Historical Society’s library, nevertheless significant resources are available among the
Urban Studies and the Ohio Network collections.
 

Guide to 20th Century African American Resources at the Cincinnati Historical
Society Library http://library.cincymuseum.org/aag/intro.html

    The Cincinnati Historical Society’s library collection is rich in materials relating to the history of
African Americans in Cincinnati.
 

Uclid http://uclid.uc.edu/search

    Conduct author, title, keyword, or subject searches in Uclid, the University of Cincinnati’s
library online catalog, to locate books about African American topics in the University of
Cincinnati’s library collections.
    
OhioLINK http://www.ohiolink.edu/
     Conduct author, title, keyword, or subject searches in OhioLINK, the combined online
catalogs of Ohio’s colleges and universities, to locate books about African American topics
in statewide library collections
 

Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County http://www.cincinnatilibrary.org/

    Conduct author, title, keyword, or subject searches in PLCH’s online catalog to locate books
about African American topics in the public library’s collections.
 

National Underground Railroad Freedom Center http://www.freedomcenter.org/

    This recently opened museum contains a small library whose books are cataloged and listed in Uclid.
 

Digitized Collections
Digital reproductions of books and other materials relating to African American Studies are available
in these online resources:
 

African American Experience in Ohio 1850-1920 http://dbs.ohiohistory.org/africanam/

    “The African-American Experience in Ohio 1850-1920 is a digital collection brought together from
a number of individual sources specifically for this project. These sources include manuscript collections,
newspaper articles, serials, photographs, and pamphlets.”
 

African-American Women Online Archival Collections
http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/collections/african-american-women.html

    Includes published and unpublished materials in the archival collections of Duke University’s library.
 

African American Women Writers of the 19th Century http://digital.nypl.org/schomburg/writers_aa19/

    This project of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture,
The New York Public Library, “is a digital collection of some 52 published works by 19th-century black women writers.”
 

American Memory http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amtitle.html

    Browse through this listing of all collections in the Library of Congress’s American Memory
database to find the many digitized collections of African American materials that it contains. 
You may also find useful this resource guide produced by the Library of Congress:
The African-American Mosaic: A Library of Congress Resource Guide for the Study of Black
History and Culture http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/african/intro.html
 

Amistad Research Center http://www.amistadresearchcenter.org/INDEX.cfm

    “The Amistad Research Center makes available to researchers over 600 manuscript
collections and over 20,000 books, documenting the rich history of African Americans and
other ethnic groups.”  The Center has recently digitized this collection of more than 5000
photographs representing the work of the American Missionary Association from 1839 through
1954:  The American Missionary Association and the Promise of a Multicultural America: 1839-1954
http://www.amistadresearchcenter.org/lsudigital-frameset/lsudigital.htm
 

Black Population in the United States http://www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/race/black.html
     This site contains census figures relating to the African American population in the United States drawn
from the publications of the U.S. Census Bureau from 1992 to 2002, and includes the 1990 and 2000 census
of population figures.  For information on the collection of racial information in the decennial censuses, read the
following digitized publication: Measuring America: The Decennial Censuses from 1790 to 2000
http://www.census.gov/prod/2002pubs/pol02-ma.pdf
      The library owns a microfilm collection of the published decennial censuses from 1790 through 1960: U.S.
decennial census publications, 1790-1970 C 3.790-960:LANGSAM Micro Gov.  The library also owns
more recent decennial censuses in several formats.  Consult the Government Documents Librarian for additional
information: lorna.newman@uc.edu
      Additional information about the African American population in the United States may be obtained from the
work of the Population Reference Bureau http://www.prb.org/ .  “ For more than 70 years, the Population
Reference Bureau has been informing people about the population dimensions of important social, economic, and
political issues. Our mission is to be the leader in providing timely and objective information on U.S. and international
population trends and their implications.”
 

Documenting the American South: North American Slave Narratives http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/neh.html

    "North American Slave Narratives, Beginnings to 1920" documents the individual and collective story of the
African American struggle for freedom and human rights in the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
When completed, it will include all the narratives of fugitive and former slaves published in broadsides, pamphlets,
or book form in English up to 1920 and many of the biographies of fugitive and former slaves published in English
before 1920.”
 

Documenting the American South: The Church in the Southern Black Community
http://docsouth.unc.edu/church/index.html

    "The Church in the Southern Black Community" traces how Southern African Americans experienced and
transformed Protestant Christianity into the central institution of community life.”
 

Frederick  Douglass Papers http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/doughtml/doughome.html

    Part of the Library of Congress’s American Memory Project (see above).  “The first release of the Douglass
Papers, from the Library of Congress's Manuscript Division, contains approximately 2,000 items (16,000 images)
relating to Douglass's life as an escaped slave, abolitionist, editor, orator, and public servant. The papers span the
years 1841 to 1964, with the bulk of the material from 1862 to 1895.”
 

Freedmen and Southern Society Project http://www.history.umd.edu/Freedmen/home.html

    This site includes a sampling of primary source documents culled from the National Archives of the United States
for inclusion in Freedom: A Documentary History of Emancipation (Langsam Stacks E185.2.F88)

 

In the First Person http://www.inthefirstperson.com

     This website is provided free by Alexander Street Press.  Updated regularly, In the First Person “…provides
in-depth indexing of more than 2,500 collections of oral history in English from around the world. With future releases,
the index will broaden to identify other first-person content, including letters, diaries, memoirs, and autobiographies, and
other personal narratives.”  Use in conjunction with:

Oral History Online

Oral History Online is a landmark index to English language oral histories. Working with archives, repositories and
individuals Alexander Street Press has indexed oral histories that are publicly available on the Web and that are held
by repositories and archives around the world. Their intent is to make it possible to find and explore the voices of more
than 300,000 individuals.

Connect

 

Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers Project http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/

    This web site describes the MLK, Jr. publication project that will fill 14 volumes when completed
(The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr. Langsam E185.97K5A2 1992).  The site also includes biographical
information about Dr. King, including the online King Encyclopedia.
 

National Underground Freedom Center e-Books

http://ebooks.ohiolink.edu:8080/cgi/t/text/text-idx?tpl=browse.tpl&c=nurfc
      Under construction, this site will provide an increasing number of digital versions of books from the collections
of the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center.  These two books are currently available:   

  

Schomburg Studies on the Black Experience Connect"

     "... Schomburg Studies on the Black Experience, a unique database detailing the rich tapestry of the African
experience throughout the Americas. Explore interdisciplinary topics through in-depth essays; read the seminal
research and timelines that accompany each topic; and search for images and film clips to provide another dimension
to your research. Investigate both historical viewpoints and new methodologies to better understand the complex nature
of Black Studies today."
 
Voices from the Days of Slavery: Former Slaves Tell Their Stories http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/vfshtml/   
     Part of the Library of Congress’s American Memory Project (see above). “Voices from the Days of Slavery:
Former Slaves Tell Their Stories provides the opportunity to listen to former slaves describe their lives. These interviews,
conducted between 1932 and 1975, capture the recollections of twenty-three identifiable people born between 1823
and the early 1860s and known to have been former slaves. Several of the people interviewed were centenarians, the oldest
being 130 at the time of the interview.”  Use in conjunction with Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal
Writers’ Project, also part of the American Memory Project: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/snhtml/snhome.html
The Langsam Library owns many collections of slave narratives, including The American Slave: A Composite
Autobiography and its Supplement (Langsam E441.A58 and Supplement).  The library also owns a collection of slavery
and anti-slavery pamphlets once in the libraries of Salmon P. Chase and John P. Hale: Microfilm Edition of Slavery and
Anti-Slavery Pamphlets…(Langsam Microfilm 783) as well as parts A-G of the Records of Ante-bellum Southern
Plantations from the Revolution through the Civil War (Langsam Microfilm 1051; The Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County owns the complete set) and Southern Historical Manuscripts: Plantation Records from the Department of Archives, Louisiana State University (Langsam Microfiche 14). Another important collection of slavery documents is Helen T. Catterall’s Judicial Cases Concerning American Slavery and the Negro (Langsam E441.C35).
 

Genealogical Materials

African American Cemeteries Online http://www.prairiebluff.com/aacemetery/

     This is a volunteer project that is part of the Millennium Project that is working to build an online database of
African American genealogical material.  Listings are compiled from cemetery headstones.  Some Ohio cemeteries
are included
Additional sources of African American genealogical materials may be obtained from these sites:

AfriGeneas List of Links-African American Genealogical Resources on the Internet
http://www.afrigeneas.com/links/

    This site provides links to many online resources related to African American history such as Freedmen’s Bureau
Online http://www.freedmensbureau.com/index.htm

Cyndi’s List of Genealogy Sites on the Internet-African American http://www.cyndislist.com/african.htm
 

Microfilm Sets
     Some important microfilm and microfiche sets that relate to African American Studies include:

ACLU Records and Publications, 1917-1975 (Langsam Microfilm 722) and Guide
(Langsam Microforms KF4742.3.A5)

The ACLU participated in important legal cases, including the Scottsboro Boys Trial, and defended the rights of
Muhammad Ali and Martin Luther King, Jr.  The ACLU also participated in defending voting rights.
 
Black Power Movement. Part 3: Papers of the Revolutionary Action Movement 1962-1996 (Langsam
Microfilm 1349)
 
Countee Cullen Papers, 1921-1969 Langsam Microfilm 701 and Guide Micro PS3505.U28Z64
 
Du Bois, W.E.B. The Papers of W.E.b. Du Bois 1877-1965 Langsam Microfilm 870 and Guide
Micro Z8244.9.M3
 

FBI File
     The library owns a collection of FBI File materials, a large number of which relate to African Americans or
African American groups (e.g. Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., Malcolm X, Paul Robeson, Roy Wilkins, Black
Panther Party, National Negro Congress).  To view the library’s holdings conduct a keyword search in Uclid
using the words FBI and File.
 

Hamer, Fannie Lou.  Fannie Lou Hamer Papers, 1966-1978 Langsam Microfilm 1058 and Guide
Micro E185.97.H25A45 1985

    Correspondence, business papers, and other records of the noted African American civil rights activist

Papers of John and Lugenia Burns Hope (Langsam Microfilm 1053) and Guide (Langsam Micro
LC2851.M72P37 1984 Guide)

    Correspondence, official records, articles, essays, and speeches of the first Black president of Morehouse
College.
Papers of the Congress of Racial Equality, 1941-1967 (Langsam Microfilm 847) and Guide ( Langsam
Micro Z1249.A8C6)
     The original advertising brochure for this set featured a photograph of picketers demonstrating against
segregation in the school of music that became part of the University’s College Conservatory of Music.
Papers of the NAACP (Langsam Microfilm 889) and Guide (Langsam Microforms E185.5.N276G8)
     Meetings, speeches, special reports, records of annual conferences and other documents are included in
this collection.  The library owns parts 1-6 (Part 6 relates to the Scottsboro Case), part 12, Selected Branch
Files (Part 12, series C are the branch files for Cincinnati from 1911 to 1939), and Supplement to Part 1,
1951-1955.  The remaining parts of this collection may be borrowed from the Center for Research Libraries
http://wwwcrl.uchicago.edu/
    An item of related interest is FBI File, NAACP (Langsam Microfilm 5480) and Guide (Langsam
Microforms E185.5N276G83 1990)
Southern Tenant Farmer’s Union Papers, 1934-1970 (Langsam Microfilm 743) and Guide (Langsam
Micro Z5075.M5S67 1971)
    Roy Wilkins was a founding member of the Southern Tenant Farmer’s Union.
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee Papers, 1959-1972 (Langsam Microfilm 877) and Guide
(Langsam Microform Z1361.N39S88)
    Items of related interest are The Student Voice, 1960-1965: Periodical of the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee (Langsam E185.61.S916 1990) and FBI File, the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee (Langsam Microfilm 5481) and Guide (Langsam Micro E185.61.U46 1991).

  

    

Web site content: Sally Moffitt