Required Books:

    Douglass, Frederick.  Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written by Himself, ed. David W. Blight.  Boston:  St. Martin's, 1993.

    Bell, Derrick.  Faces at the Bottom of the Well:  The Permanence of Racism.  New York:  Basic Books, 1993.

    Ellison, Ralph.  Invisible Man.  New York:  Random House, 1995.

    Meier, August and Elliot M. Rudwick.  From Planation to Ghetto:  An Interpretive History of American Negroes, 3rd ed. New York:  Hill and Wang, 1976.

    McLaurin, Melton.  Celia, A Slave.  New York:  Avon Books, 1993.

    Sleeper, Jim.  Liberal Racism: How Fixating on Race Perverts the American Dream.  New York:  Viking Books, 1998.
 

Materials on Reserve

    Cohen, William, "Reinventing the Black Codes," chapter 8 of At Freedom's Edge:  Black Mobility and the Southern White Quest for Racial Control, 1861-1915.  Baton Rouge, LA:  LSU Press, 1991.
    Cohen, William, "Thomas Jefferson and the Problem of Slavery," Journal of American History, 56 (December 1969), 503-526.
    Genovese, Eugene, "The Moment of Truth," in Roll Jordan Roll:  The World the Slaves Made (New York:  Random House, 1974), pp. 97-112.

Hereafter these works will be referred to only by the author's last name
 

Required Source Readings

Each student will locate at least two sources written by the slaveholders themselves or by members of their families.  At least one of these sources must come from the library and one may be found on the internet.  Your readings should total no less than fifty pages.  Keep a record of the works you have read including author, title, volume and exact page numbers.  Choose your library book(s) from Sections I or II on the Selected Bibliography.  Choose your internet source from works by white planters to be found in:
 

• Documenting The American South: University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

http://sunsite.unc.edu/docsouth/

Wed. Jan. 12. Introduction.  A Word About the Readings:  Don't wait till the last minute.  Start reading ahead NOW.

Fri., Jan. 14. About the Institution of Slavery.

Mon., Jan. 17. Slavery in Ancient and Medieval Thought.

• Read: Leviticus, 25: 39-46; Philemon.

Fri., Jan. 21. Slavery and the Age of Discovery.  The Slave Trade.

• Read:  Meier, 27-41.
• Required WWW Reading:

Excerpt from The Life of Olaudah Equiano
http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~wldciv/world_civ_reader/world_civ_reader_2/equiano.html

• Read:  Meier, 41-54.

Fri., Jan. 28. The Eighteenth Century Evolution of American Slavery.

Mon., Jan. 31. Slavery and the American Revolution.

• Read:  Cohen, "Thomas Jefferson and the Problem of Slavery."

• Read:  Meier, 54-75; Douglass, 1-145.
• Required WWW Readings:

The Alabama Slave Code of 1833
http://www.archives.state.al.us/teacher/slavery/lesson1/doc1.html

Mon., Feb. 7.  FOUR PAGE PAPER DUE TODAY

Wed., Feb. 9. Antebellum Slavery:  The World the Slaves Made.

• Read:  Meier, 75-86; McLaurin, 1-136.
• Optional WWW Readings:

Documenting The American South: UNC-CH.  Dip into a few of the slave narratives in this collection.
http://sunsite.unc.edu/docsouth/

Mon.  Feb 14.  Winter Break.

Wed., Feb. 16. Class Discussion of McLaurin, Douglass, planter sources and assigned WWW readings pertaining to slavery. Do not miss this lesson.

Fri., Feb. 18. Slavery and the Coming of the Civil War:  The Abolition Movement in the North.

• Read:  Meier, 87-98, 121-152.

• Optional WWW Reading:

William Lloyd Garrison: "On the Death of John Brown"
http://www.historyplace.com/speeches/garrison.htm

Fri., Feb. 25. Slavery, Race, and the Civil War.

• Read:  Meier, 153-165; Genovese, "The Moment of Truth."

Mon., Feb. 28. MIDTERM EXAMINATION.  COVERS EVERYTHING TO DATE

Wed.,  Mar.1 Reconstruction.

• Read:  Meier, 165-193.

Wed., Mar. 8. "Redemption".

• Read:  Cohen, "Reinventing the Black Codes."  Start reading Ellison.

Wed., Mar. 15. Race and the Nation at the Nadir.

• Read:  Meier, 194-231.
• Required WWW Readings:

Booker T. Washington, Biographical Sketch
http://www.eb.com:180/bol/topic?eu=78193&sctn=1#s_top
Booker T. Washington, "The Atlanta Compromise"
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/text/1642b-booker.html
W.E.B. DuBois. Souls of Black Folk, Chapter 3.
http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new?id=DuBSoul&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=3&division=div

Fri., Mar. 17.  Spring Break Begins

Mon., Mar. 27.  Race and the Nation at the Nadir (continued)

Wed., Mar. 29. The Great Migration and Its Consequences

• Read:  Meier, 232-270.

Mon., Apr. 3. African American Protest:  Thought and Action: 1905-1954.

Fri., Apr. 7. Class Discussion of The Invisible Man.

• Read: Ellison, all.

Mon., Apr. 10. The Supreme Court and Race in the Twentieth Century (to 1954).

• Read: Bell, 1-200.
• Required WWW Reading:

Brown v. Board of Education I (1954)
http://www.bus.miami.edu/~jmonroe/brown.htm

Mon., Apr. 17. The Civil Rights Movement, 1956-1963.

• Read:  Meier, 271-313.
• EIGHT PAGE PAPER DUE TODAY

• Read:  Meier, 314-357; Sleeper, all

Fri., Apr. 28. Class Discussion of Bell and Sleeper.

Mon., May 1. Final Examination at 2:00 P.M.
 

Other Resources:
        Guide to the Course
        Guide to Papers
        Slavery, A Selected Bibliography
        Discus
        Email:  cohen@hope.edu