Black History Month Theme 2021
The Black History Month Theme for 2021 is The Black Family: Representation, Identity, and Diversity. The black family has been a topic of study in many disciplines—history, literature, the visual arts and film studies, sociology, anthropology, and social policy. Its representation, identity, and diversity have been reverenced, stereotyped, and vilified from the days of slavery to our own time. The black family knows no single location, since family reunions and genetic-ancestry searches testify to the spread of family members across states, nations, and continents. Not only are individual black families diasporic, but Africa and the diaspora itself have been long portrayed as the black family at large (https://asalh.org/black-history-themes/).
This guide provides resources on the black family and black history. Click on the tabs at the top to navigate the guide and click on the links throughout to view resources.
Databases
- Black Freedom Struggle in the United States This link opens in a new window
- History Reference Source This link opens in a new window
- Academic Search Premier This link opens in a new window
- Films On Demand This link opens in a new windowProvides access to streaming educational videos, including academic, vocational, and life-skills content.
The Black Family: Representation, Identity, and Diversity.
eBooks
Black Families at the Crossroads by
This updated edition of the classic book Black Families at the Crossroads, offers a comprehensive examination of the diverse and complex issues surrounding Black families. Leanor Boulin Johnson and Robert Staples combine more than sixty years of writing and research on Black families to offer insights into the pre-slavery development of the Black middle class, internal processes that affect all class strata among Black American families, the impact of race on modern Black immigrant families, the interaction of external forces and internal norms at each stage of the Black family life cycle, and public policies that provide challenges and promising prospects for the continuing resilience of the Black family as an American institution. This thoroughly revised edition features new research, including empirical studies and theoretical applications, and a review of significant social polices and economic changes in the past decade and their impact on Black families.
ISBN: 9780787972226Publication Date: 2004-09-29
Black Fathers in Contemporary American Society by
The majority of African American children live in homes without their fathers, but the proportion of African American children living in intact, two-parent families has risen significantly since 1995. Black Fathers in Contemporary American Society looks at father absence from two sides, offering an in-depth analysis of how the absence of African American fathers affects their children, their relationships, and society as a whole, while countering the notion that father absence and family fragmentation within the African American community is inevitable. Editors Obie Clayton, Ronald B. Mincy, and David Blankenhorn lead a diverse group of contributors encompassing a range of disciplines and ideological perspectives who all agree that father absence among black families is one of the most pressing social problems today. In part I, the contributors offer possible explanations for the decline in marriage among African American families. William Julius Wilson believes that many men who live in the inner city no longer consider marriage an option because their limited economic prospects do not enable them to provide for a family. Part II considers marriage from an economic perspective, emphasizing that it is in part a wealth-producing institution. Maggie Gallagher points out that married people earn, invest, and save more than single people, and that when marriage rates are low in a community, it is the children who suffer most. In part III, the contributors discuss policies to reduce absentee fatherhood. Wornie Reed demonstrates how public health interventions, such as personal development workshops and work-related skill-building services, can be used to address the causes of fatherlessness. Wade Horn illustrates the positive results achieved by fatherhood programs, especially when held early in a man's life. In the last chapter, Enola Aird notes that from 1995 to 2000, the proportion of African American children living in two-parent, married couple homes rose from 34.8 to 38.9 percent; a significant increase indicating the possible reversal of the long-term shift toward black family fragmentation. Black Fathers in Contemporary American Society provides an in-depth look at a problem affecting millions of children while offering proof that the trend of father absence is not irrevocable.
ISBN: 9780871541581Publication Date: 2006-03-09
Doing Justice to History by
The History curriculum in schools adopts a grand narrative approach that pushes the history of the non-dominant to the margins and even to obscurity. To secure an authentic approach to Black history, the authors have developed an enquiry-based approach that gives teachers the knowledge and confidence to teach the History curriculum inclusively. The book presents five discrete enquiries. Of three on African-American history, the first deals with the Civil Rights movement, asking why Robert E. Williams has been forgotten. A chapter takes teachers up to Obama's time, and a third, written by Jenice Lewis, describes how the US program, Teaching for Change, has pioneered work that imbues history teaching with justice. The two chapters on British Black history tackle the issue of invisibility, asking why Somali people decided to unpack their bags in Britain; and why Claudia Jones, founder of the first Black journal in England, and founder of the world-famous Notting Hill Carnival has no memorial plaque outside her house in England nor in her homeland. One chapter on African history looks at African Empires and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, and one looks - sideways - at apartheid in South Africa.
ISBN: 9781858565521Publication Date: 2016-01-28
Reconceptualizing the Strengths and Common Heritage of Black Families by
"The purpose of this book is to provide a comprehensive analysis and critique of the existing bodies of research literature on black families, children, and communities, and the effects of that literature on the status of this population today. New and expanded practice and research frameworks with culturally sensitive guidelines for rebuilding and increasing self- and collective sufficiency of this heterogeneous group is presented. These frameworks are used to propose specific approaches to culturally meaningful research, practice, and policy development related to black families."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved
ISBN: 9780398074890Publication Date: 2004-07-01
You Gotta Deal with It by
At a time when blacks are returning to the South in record numbers, this book offers proof that the stereotypical Southern town - replete with poverty, prejudice, and hopelessness for blacks - still persists despite the civil rights revolution. Presenting an anthropological overview of onecommunity and in-depth analysis of four extended families, this book dispels misconceptions about the Southern black family and shows it to be a coherent, well-defined, and viable structure.
ISBN: 9780195025927Publication Date: 1980-03-06
