UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON
Department of History
Winter 2012
Instructor: Professor Quintard Taylor
Office: Smith 316-A
Phone: (206) 543-5698
Email: qtaylor
u [dot] washington [dot] edu.
Office Hours: 6:00-7:00 p.m. TuTh
Faculty Website: http://faculty.washington.edu/qtaylor/
Resource Website: http://blackpast.org/
HSTAA 322: AFRICAN AMERICAN HISTORY SINCE 1900
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
The history of African Americans has been a paradox of incredible triumph in the face of tremendous human tragedy. This course will present a detailed examination of the black experience in America from 1900 to today to provide an understanding of the role African Americans have played in the history of the American nation and an assessment of why they were until the recent past, excluded from the promise of American democracy. We will continue our analysis of the various political, economic, social, and cultural methods African Americans have employed to survive in an overwhelmingly hostile environment and assess their prospects as they make the final frontal assault on the structure of racially discriminatory institutions. Is the battle against racism and discrimination over? Using a variety of historians and history sources, we shall try to answer that question during this quarter.
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Required Textbooks:
Darlene Clark Hine, William C. Hine and Stanley Harrold, The African American Odyssey, Volume Two, (2009)
Quintard Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community: Seattle's Central District from 1870 through the Civil Rights Era (1994)
Raymond D'Angelo, ed., The American Civil Rights Movement: Readings and Interpretations (2001) [on electronic reserve]
Thomas Sugrue, Not Even Past: Barack Obama and the Burden of Race (2009) [on electronic reserve]
Additional Resource:
BlackPast.org (www.blackpast.org)
Supplemental Readings:
I have placed on reserve in Odegaard Undergraduate Library additional readings which will help explain African America. As the need arises I may add other articles to the reserve room holdings. All readings other than those in purchased texts are on reserve.
Examinations/Grading:
Your course grade is based on three exercises: a midterm exam, a final examination and a 10-12 page research paper (see manual for details on the paper). The midterm is scheduled for the end of the fifth week. Some students will be unable to take the midterm exam with the rest of the class. In that case I ask them to take a makeup exam scheduled for 5:00 6:00 p.m. on the last Friday of instruction during the quarter. The room will be announced later. Since the makeup exam will be penalized 10 points on a 100 point exercise, all students should make every effort to take the exam at its scheduled time.
Those students who perform poorly on the midterm exam (69 or below) have the option of writing a book review to offset that grade. Should you choose to write the review, it can be handed in no later than the Friday of the ninth week of the term. Please read the page titled Optional Book Review Assignment in the manual before initiating your review.
My grading procedures are simple. Since each exam is worth up to 100 points I will average your numerical score. I will also assign a numerical score for your research paper, "C"=75, "C+"=78, etc. Your numerical scores will then be averaged to determine your course grade. Thus if your overall average is 76 your course grade will be the numerical equivalent of a "C" in the UW grading system.
I do not issue "incompletes" to students who by the end of the quarter have not taken an exam, handed in an assigned paper or otherwise met the course requirements. If you have not completed all of the course requirements by the end of exam week, and you have not, by that point, explained why, your grade will be lowered accordingly.
READING ASSIGNMENTS
Week 1: African America at the Dawn of the 20th Century
Booker T. Washington, "The Atlanta Compromise Speech," (1895) on BlackPast.org
Hine, The African American Odyssey, Chapters 14-15
Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community, Chapter 1
Week 2: The Rise of Militant Protest: The Niagara Movement and the NAACP
Rev. Francis J. Grimke, "The Negro Will Never Acquiesce As Long As He Lives," (1898) on BlackPast.org
W.E.B. DuBois, "Men of Niagara," (1906) on BlackPast.org
Hine, The African American Odyssey, Chapter 16
Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community, pp. 79-90
Film: The Rise and Fall of Jim Crow, Program 2, Fighting Back, 1896-1917
Weeks 3-4: The Great Migration: Blacks in the Urban North
William Pickens, "The Kind of Democracy the Negro Expects," (1919) on BlackPast.org
Hine, The African American Odyssey, Chapter 17
Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community, Chapters 2, 5
Week 5: Prosperity and Depression
Marcus Garvey, "Address to the Second UNIA Convention," (1921) on BlackPast.org
Hine, The African American Odyssey, Chapters 18-19
Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community, pp. 90-105
Film: Look for Me in the Whirlwind, Marcus Garvey.
MIDTERM EXAM
Week 6: World War II and the West Coast Migration
Hine, The African American Odyssey, Chapter 20
Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community, Chapter 6
Week 7: We Shall Overcome: 1946-1964
Roy Wilkins, "The Clock Will Not Be Turned Back," (1957) on BlackPast.org
Martin Luther King, Jr., "Letter from a Birmingham City Jail," (1963) on BlackPast.org
Hine, The African American Odyssey, Chapter 21
Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community, pp. 190-216
Film: Segregation, Northern-Style, 1964
Week 8: The Struggle Continues, The Black Power Era: 1965-1980
Malcolm X, "The Ballot or the Bullet," (1964) on BlackPast.org
Stokely Carmichael, "Black Power," (1966) on BlackPast.org
Hine, The African American Odyssey, Chapter 22
Taylor, The Forging of a Black Community, pp. 216-233
Film: Black Power, White Backlash, 1966
Week 9: African America in A Conservative Era, 1981-2000
Lyndon B. Johnson, "To Fulfill These Rights," (1965) on BlackPast.org
Rev. Jesse Jackson, "The Rainbow Coalition," (1984) on BlackPast.org
Robert Staples, "The Illusion of Racial Equality: The Black American Dilemma," (1993) in D'Angelo, The American Civil Rights Movement, pp. 557-565 (on e-reserve)
Randall Kennedy, "My Race Problem--and Ours," (1997) in D 'Angelo, The American Civil Rights Movement, pp. 573-582 (on e-reserve)
Film: Race: The Power of an Illusion--Episode One, The Difference Between Us
Week 10: The Barack Obama Era and the End of Race?
Bill Cosby, "The Pound Cake Speech," (2004) on BlackPast.org
Barack Obama, "Speech on Race," (2008) on BlackPast.org
Thomas Sugrue, "A More Perfect Union? The Burden of Race in Obama's America," (2009), Chapter 3 of Not Even Past: Barack Obama and the Burden of Race, pp. 92-137 (available electronically through the UW library catalog)
