History Of Black Americans Research Articles

Absence and Presence: Nona Faustine and the Black Body in the National History of the United States

How should the history of Black Americans be included in the physical landscape and memorialised? What new visual vocabularies are needed to expand the idea of the nation? Nona Faustine’s White Shoes series (begun in 2012) provides a compelling counternarrative to stereotypical and racist representations of Black Americans in public spaces. With her body, Faustine explores the links between colonialism, racism, and capitalism that continues to be celebrated in public monuments in the United States. Her works invite viewers to participate in and interact with the built environment in new ways that acknowledge these public spaces as sites of nationalism intimately connected to the history of US racism – slave labour, Jim Crow, and police violence. In White Shoes, Nona Faustine contests dominant and entrenched national myths through the materiality of her body – her Black body. Her interventions in public space re-inscribe a neglected history onto the urban landscapes of New York City. Faustine’s work challenges white patriarchal dominance through mediated images of Black bodies by creating presence where there is absence.

"Falling between the cracks": Experiences of Black dementia caregivers navigating U.S. health systems.

In addition to numerous care responsibilities, family caregivers are expected to navigate health systems and engage in healthcare management tasks on behalf of their persons living with dementia (PLWD). These challenging tasks pose additional difficulties for Black dementia caregivers. Due to the centuries-old, disadvantaged social history of Black Americans, several unique stressors, vulnerabilities, and resources have emerged which inform and affect Black dementia caregivers' experiences and well-being. Focus groups were held with Black caregivers (N=19) from the United States to explore the unique experiences and perspectives of this population navigating the U.S. health system on behalf of their PLWD. Five overarching themes were constructed during thematic analysis: Forced Advocacy, Poor Provider Interaction, Payor Source Dictates Care, Discrimination, and Broken Health System. Black dementia caregivers unanimously concurred that the health system that they experience in America is "broken." Gaps in the health system can lead to people [as one caregiver passionately expressed] "falling between the cracks," in terms of care, services, and resources needed. Caregivers agreed that class, sex, utilizing public health insurance, and being a "person of color" contribute to their difficulties navigating the health system. Caregivers perceived being dismissed by providers, forcing them to advocate for both themselves and their PLWD. Healthcare providers and researchers can utilize these findings to improve the experiences and healthcare outcomes of Black persons living with dementia and their caregivers. Additionally, these findings can lead to the development of culturally tailored caregiver education programs.

Falling Between the Cracks: Experiences of Black Dementia Caregivers Navigating U.S. Health Systems

In addition to numerous care responsibilities, family caregivers are expected to navigate health systems and engage in healthcare management tasks on behalf of their persons living with dementia (PLWD). These challenging tasks pose additional difficulties for Black dementia caregivers. Due to the centuries-old, disadvantaged social history of Black Americans, several unique stressors, vulnerabilities, and resources have emerged which inform and affect Black dementia caregivers’ experiences and well-being. Focus groups were held with Black caregivers (N = 19) from the United States (U.S.) to explore the unique experiences and perspectives of this population navigating the U.S. health system on behalf of their PLWD. Five overarching themes were developed during thematic analysis: Forced Advocacy, Poor Provider Interaction, Payor Source Dictates Care, Discrimination, and Broken Health System. Black dementia caregivers unanimously concurred that the health system that they experience in America is “broken.” Gaps in the health system can lead to people [as one caregiver passionately expressed] “falling between the cracks,” in terms of care, services, and resources needed. Caregivers agreed that class, sex, utilizing public health insurance, and being a “person of color” contribute to their difficulties navigating the health system. Caregivers perceived being dismissed by providers, forcing them to advocate for both themselves and their PLWD. Healthcare providers and researchers can utilize these findings to improve the experiences and healthcare outcomes of Black patients with dementia and their caregivers. Additionally, these findings can lead to the development of culturally tailored caregiver education programs.

America's Racist Founding? An East-European View

The article discusses the recent movement initiated by the NYT to „reframe“ American history, as if the United States was established in 1619 and its main aim was to preserve slavery at any price. We sum up the timeline of the discussion from 2019 till the present. Since an East European historian sees the striking similarities with the Communist anti-American propaganda, we ask here, to what extent is this present approach dependent on the propagandist image of the past. In the first part, we explore the way history of Black Americans had been exploited by the propaganda from 1951 to 1990, then we examine the arguments put forward by the present-day 1619 Project. Whereas the Communist propaganda put emphasis on the principle that Black and white workers should unite against capitalism (or „fascism“), the present-day approach sees Black Americans as the only exploited class in the US. It has racialized also many other elements of the Marxist historiography (e.g. primary accumulation, class struggles).

Editorial: Investigating Black Activism in the Civil War Era

This special thematic issue of the Civil War Book Review is dedicated to recent works that uncover, reveal, and recast the history of Black Americans’ emancipation activism in the Civil War Era. The concept of emancipation carried myriad meanings among nineteenth-century Black Americans, which the scholarship reviewed below reflects. These authors have catalogued nineteenth-century Black Americans’ vibrant and dynamic efforts to emancipate themselves from slavery, to achieve citizenship and its attendant rights, to secure personal safety, to gain social standing, and to attain economic stability. These books emphasize nineteenth-century African Americans possessed a complex political consciousness that was finely tuned to local, state, and national political developments and white efforts to limit their rights. Their political consciousness inspired their long-standing determination to gain what they knew was deservedly theirs—as Americans, as humans—without waiting for a white savior.

On Answering the Call to Action for COVID-19: Continuing a Bold Legacy of Health Advocacy

The indelible impacts on our nation from the Coronavirus pandemic along with high fatality rates that disproportionately burden racial and ethnic minorities necessitate long-term coordinated federal, state and local action to improve critical determinants of population health, specifically important health and public health infrastructures as well as emergency and disaster preparedness systems. While our purview as the new pandemic epicenter should be a sufficient driver, coordinated health professionals bringing thoughtful attention to our historical context may be warranted. Prompting our advocacy should be the reality that our collective ability to rebound from such crises may ultimately hinge on protecting and equipping our most vulnerable racial-ethnic minority groups and any susceptible individuals within those populations. Recent historic firsts on behalf of racial and ethnic minorities taken by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, through the Health Resources and Services Administration, the Office of Minority Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in response to COVID-19, if proven effective, should be considered for permanency within policy, practice and funding. In addition, given the complex history of Black Americans in this country and persistent and substantial Black-white disparities on health and economic measures across the board, the ultimate solution for improving the health and status Black Americans may look slightly different. Influenced by the 400th year anniversary of the first documented arrival of unfree Africans in North America in 1619, as well as the introduction of bills S.1080 and H.R.40 into Congress (The Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African-Americans Act), some kind of reparations for Black Americans might serve as the logical starting point for further advocacy. Nevertheless, we remain supportive allies of all organizations concerned with communities who suffer the weight of this pandemic and any future world health disasters. What is additionally needed is a thoughtful unification of efforts and a commitment to sustained progress with measurable results for as long as the need exists and certainly for the foreseeable future. Let us as humane clinicians and public health professionals capture this moment of challenge and follow through on this urgent call to action.

Structural Racism in American Psychiatry and APA: Part 1

Structural Racism in American Psychiatry and APA: Part 1

On Answering the Call to Action For COVID-19: Continuing a Bold Legacy of Health Advocacy

The disproportionately high burden of death and disability observed for racial and ethnic minorities under the Coronavirus pandemic necessitates sustained advocacy by the medical and public health communities around critical determinants of population health. Prompting our advocacy should be the understanding that our collective ability to rebound from such crises may ultimately hinge on protecting and equipping our most vulnerable racial-ethnic minority groups and any susceptible individuals within those populations. If proven effective, recent historic firsts by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), the Office of Minority Health (OMH) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in response to COVID-19 should be championed for permanency within policy, practice and funding. In addition, given the complex history of Black Americans in this country and persistent and substantial Black-white disparities on health and economic measures across the board, some kind of reparations for this group may serve as a logical starting point for further advocacy. Nevertheless, we remain supportive allies of all organizations concerned with communities who suffer the weight of this pandemic and any future world health disasters. Let us as human clinicians and public health professionals capture this moment of challenge and engage in thoughtful unification of effort and commit to measurable progress for as long as the need exists and certainly for the foreseeable future.

CHRISTINA GREENE. Our Separate Ways: Women and the Black Freedom Movement in Durham, North Carolina. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. 2005. Pp. xviii, 366. Cloth $59.95, paper $19.95

This book is a valuable treatment of women's participation in the black freedom movement. Christina Greene presents a sweeping examination of activism in the city that sociologist E. Franklin Frazier named “the capital of the black middle-class.” She integrates the complex issues of gender, race, and class into the legacy of African American women's community work in the modern freedom movement. Greene analyzes the activism of several generations of low-income and middle-class black and white women demonstrating how it shaped the struggle for black freedom. The author argues that local, low-income community activists were the primary agents of change. Her gendered perspective adds another dimension to the history of black Americans and demands that we rethink the post-World War II struggle for economic and social justice. Prior to World War II, working-class women joined the Parent Teaches Association (PTA), the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), literary clubs, and churches. By the 1950s African American women were insisting on membership in mainstream, organizations such as the Young Women's Christian Association, the League of Women Voters, the American Association of University Women, and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (p. 4). The new solidarity of black and white women in a city about to embark on a black direct action movement was an accomplishment (p. 61).

Accidental Communities: Race, Emergency Medicine, and the Problem of PolyHeme®

This article focuses on emergency medical care in black urban populations, suggesting that the classification of a “community” within clinical trial language is problematic. The article references a cultural history of black Americans with pre-hospital emergency medical treatment as relevant to contemporary emergency medicine paradigms. Part I explores a relationship between “autonomy” and “community.” The idea of community emerges as a displacement for the ethical principle of autonomy precisely at the moment that institutionalized medicine focuses on diversity. Part II examines a clinical trial for the blood substitute PolyHeme® (Northfield Laboratories, Inc., Evanston, IL). It illustrates the ways in which bias in research paradigms and Institutional Review Board decisions attach to the notion and utility of the language of “community.” The conclusion's contemporary anecdote makes apparent the vitality of the issues of prehospital emergency medical care and the ways in which decisions and practices fall too easily into a narrative of culturally biased treatment.

Black Civil Rights in America

This book is the authoritative introduction to the history of black civil rights in the USA. It provides a clear and useful guide to the political, social and cultural history of black Americans and their pursuit of equal rights and recognition from 1865 through to the present day. From the civil war of the 1860s to the race riots of the 1990s, Black Civil Rights details the history of the modern civil rights movement in American history. This book introduces the reader to: * leading civil rights activists* black political movements within the USA* crucial legal and political developments* the portrayal of black Americans in the media. This a book no American history or cultural studies student will want to do without.

Black philanthropy: Its heritage and its future

AbstractThe potential for black philanthropy is remarkable but accomplishing that potential requires two things: first, we must understand the basic beliefs and the dramatic history of black Americans and second, we must actively engage all elements of the African American community in defining, supporting, and controlling their philanthropic future.

Book Review: Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military

Book Review: Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military

Reviews and Short Notices

Reviews and Short Notices

The Sable Arm: Black Troops in the Union Army, 1861-1865 (review)

72CIVIL WAR HISTORY The SableArm: Black Troops in the Union Army, 1861-1865. By Dudley Taylor Cornish. Foreword by Herman Hattaway. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1987. Pp. xviii, 342. $25.00, cloth; $9.95, paper.) At least since 1643 when Abraham Pearse, a "blackamore," took up arms in defense of Massachusetts Bay Colony, Afro-Americans have been active participants in the nation's wars. Throughout much of the nation's first century-and-a-half, blacks viewed military service as a means of proving their patriotism and of achieving for all black Americans more equitable, humane treatment at the hands of the dominant society. Though willing for blacks to share the risks of war when manpower needs became acute, white Americans have rarely been willing for them to share in its glory and even less inclined to reward them with "a white man's chance" in either civilian or military life. In 1898, shortly after black soldiers received five Medals of Honor and more than twenty Certificates of Merit for their performance in the Cuban campaign of the Spanish-American War, a black observer predicted quite accurately that the nation would be "quick to forget that the first man to go to the crest of San Juan hill was a Negro, just as the fact has been forgotten that the first man who died in the American Revolution was a black man." The usual practice, he claimed, was to grant black soldiers passing notice, then allow them to become lost "in that sublime Americanism that forgets all that the Negro does but his crimes." So long as the official actions and policies of the military establishment reflected the racist attitudes of American society, Afro-American soldiers continued to besubjected to varying degrees of discrimination and exploitation . So long as racist presuppositions inspired a Jim Crow historiography , the record of their military contributions also suffered from distortion, misrepresentation, and omission. Until after World War II, standard histories as well as specialized monographs dealing with the national military experience tended to be a part of that historiographical motif. Eight years after President Harry S. Truman ordered an end to racial discrimination in the United States armed forces in 1948, Dudley Taylor Cornish, a thirty-year-old veteran of World War II, who had acquired a Ph.D. degree in history from the University of Colorado and begun his teaching career at Pittsburg State University in Kansas, published The Sable Arm: Black Troops in the Union Army, 1861-1865 (Longmans, Green, 1956). It was perhaps both revealing and significant that Cornish dedicated his volume to Eustace, a friendly, fair-complexioned Negro whom he had met on his first day in the army but who, much to Cornish's dismay, was transferred to a Jim Crow unit as soon as his black ancestry was discovered. Not only based upon impressive research in a wide range of materials, including previously untapped archival sources, but also written with grace and clarity, Cornish's volume won universal BOOK REVIEWS73 praise at the time of publication. After a period of thirty years, during which it has been read, cited and used as a model, The Sable Arm has achieved the richly deserved status of a classic. Much of what is today considered conventional knowledge about the role of blacks in the Civil War can be traced to Cornish's pioneer study. As befits a path-breaking work of the quality of The SableArm, the University Press of Kansashas reissued the volume with an incisive foreword by Herman Hattaway and a bibliographic update by the author. As the author of The Sable Arm recognized, the Civil War occupied a unique place in the military history of black Americans because, for the first time, they became a part of the American military establishment and won permanently the right to fight in the army of the United States. In recounting how these momentous achievements occurred, Cornish went far toward correcting the déficiences, myths, and misconceptions about the role of black soldiers in the war that saved the union and freed the slaves. In Cornish's view, the Civil War was a "prodigious revolution " for black Americans who, unwilling to...

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military.

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military.

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military.

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military.

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military

Strength for the Fight: A History of Black Americans in the Military

Use and Misuse of the Slave Community Paradigm

John Boles. Black Southerners, 1619-1869. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1983.244 + xii pp. Walter J. Fraser, Jr., and Winfred B. Moore, Jr., eds. The Southern Enigma: Essays on Race, Class, and Folk Culture. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1983. 240 + vi pp. Philip Foner. History of Black Americans. Volume II: From the Emergence of the Cotton Kingdom to the Eve of the Compromise of 1850. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1983. 656 + viii pp. Philip Foner. History of Black Americans. Volume III: From the Compromise of 1850 to the End of the Civil War. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1983. 539 + viii pp. Michael Wayne. The Reshaping of Plantation Society: The Natchez District, 1860-1880. Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, 1983. 226 + xii pp. The concept of the slave community underlies a fundamental reorientation of the history of slavery in the United States South. Attention has shifted from the impact of slavery on blacks to their response to enslavement, and from the master-slave relation to the relationships among slaves themselves. However many blacks may have played the role of Sambo in the presence of whites, American slaves are now often said to have led an autonomous cultural and family life among their own kind.1