Curated OER
Indians and African Americans 1780-1820
Students explain that opportunities for African Americans remained severely limited by slavery until 1783. They examine the 1783 Massachusetts abolishment of slavery and its impact.
Library of Congress
Loc: Education, Economic and Social Progress
Text, photos, song lyrics and other primary source materials document the struggle to overcome obstacles to equal rights. Click on each image to see a larger image.
Library of Congress
Loc: The African American Mosaic: Colonization
Library of Congress presents a collection of primary source material on the beginnings of the American Colonization Society and efforts of free blacks to return to Liberia during the Nineteenth Century.
Library of Congress
Loc: American Revolution
The history of the American Revolution is the focus of this article. Divided into topics and time periods, it makes understanding this historical time easier for students for follow.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Neh: Edsit Ement: Civil Rights Movement
This activity on the Civil Rights movement is organized into three sections: "Identifying the Need for Change," "Ordinary People in the Civil Rights Movement," and "Historic Places in the Civil Rights Movement."
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Teacher Serve: Somewhere in the Nadir of African American History, 1890 1920
Essay on the lesser known plight of African Americans between the years 1890 and 1920. Site includes links to related resources, guiding questions for students and debate on the issue from historians.
Digital History
Digital History: Chapter 7: Affirmative Action and the Case of Alan Bakke [Pdf]
Article presents an overview of the history behind the birth of 'affirmative action'. Includes a discussion of the Supreme Court case of Alan Bakke v. the University of California and student exercises that test comprehension of the topic.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Teacher Serve: Racial Uplift Ideology in the Era of "The Negro Problem"
History professor Kevin Gaines explores the idea that educated blacks are responsible for the welfare of the majority of the race and how the uplift ideology undermined collective social advancement.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Teacher Serve: Freedom's Story: Pigmentocracy
Trudier Harris, Professor of English at the University of North Carolina, takes a look at pigmentocracy, the distinctions that people of African descent in America make in their various skin tones. She suggests that there is a...
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Teacher Serve: The Image of Africa in the Literature of the Harlem Renaissance
Overview of African Americans and their relationship to Africa. a myth which was embraced by the Harlem Renaissance.
PBS
Pbs Learning Media: Civil Rights Special Collection
Multimedia collection of video, primary text documents and audio on Civil Rights, especially Brown vs. Board of Education.
Georgia Humanities Council and the University of Georgia Press.
New Georgia Encyclopedia: Atlanta Race Riot of 1906
Article that retells the story behind the Atlanta race riots of 1906 where white mobs killed and wounded dozens of blacks in reaction to newspaper headlines of alleged assaults of white females by blacks, general racial tensions, the...
US National Archives
Our Documents: Desegregation of the Armed Forces(1948)
Read a brief overview of the history behind this executive order that integrated the segregated military and then read a copy of the complete original text.
Michigan State University
Michigan State University: America Revolution: The First Rhode Island Regiment
Information not only about the First Rhode Island Regiment, a group made up almost entirely of freed slaves, but also a look at the change in the attitude of enlisting African Americans into the Continental Army as the Revolutionary War...
PBS
Pbs Newshour Extra: Nyt Runs Never Before Published Photos
Article reports on the decision of the New York Times to publish for the first time many photos that contribute to the understanding of African American history in the United States. Includes a video.
Other
Memorial Hall Museum: Turns of the Century
Turns of the Century chronicles three centuries, in side-by-side fashion, of American family life, of Native Americans, of African Americans, of newcomers to America, and of the American landscape.
Other
Slavery by Another Name
Read this detailed narrative to learn about the mistreatment of African Americans long after people thought slavery had ended after the Civil War, but actually persisted into the twentieth century. Based on original documents, photos,...
Other
Heart of Darkness
Complete text of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness," the inspiration for the movie "Apocalypse Now." It has been edited only to the extent that the web publisher has separated each chapter into five sections to fit his "Chapter a Day,"...
PBS
Pbs: American Experience: Fatal Flood
This resource is a companion site to a documentary about a major flooding of the Mississippi River in 1927, where in Greenville, Mississippi, efforts to contain the river pitted the majority black population against an aristocratic...
Columbia University
Columbia University: The Malcolm X Project
A site that encompasses many facets of the life of Malcolm X through interview clips, chapters from an autobiography, photos, a project journal, and more.
Smithsonian Institution
National Air and Space Museum: The Black Wings Story
This online story tells of how African Americans overcame enormous obstacles to break into aviation. Besides tracing the story there are primary sources, classroom activities, and teaching resources are included.
Stanford University
Stanford University: Lesson Plan on Martin Luther King, Jr. & Malcolm X
A comprehensive four part lesson plan exploring how the ideas of the two great African American leaders were similar and different both in their ideologies and their visions.
DOGO Media
Dogo News: February Is Black History Month
Article reports on the origins of Black History Month. Includes video.
Washington State University
Washington State University: Columbia River Basin Ethnic History Project
A collection of primary documents dealing with the ethnic groups found in the Columbia River Basin.