UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON
Department of History
Autumn, 2011
Professor Quintard Taylor
Email: qtaylor
u [dot] washington [dot] edu
Website 1: http://faculty.washington.edu/qtaylor/
Website 2: www.blackpast.org
Office: 316A Smith Hall
Phone: 206 543-5698
Office Hours: 3:30-5:30 M, 11:30-12:30 Tu
History 540: AFRICAN AMERICAN URBAN HISTORY, 1800-2000
INTRODUCTION:
This field course examines the growth and evolution of African American urban communities from 1800 to the beginning of the 21st Century. The seminar's goal is twofold: first, to introduce the historiography and methodology of black urban history; and second, to determine how the urban experience of African Americans shaped the contemporary world of all urbanites.
In addition we hope the various histories discussed over the quarter, and our critical scrutiny of the texts will encourage you to engage in fresh perspectives and creative approaches to the reconstruction of African American urban history. Although our knowledge of that history has risen dramatically in the past three decades, we still know woefully little about black urbanization in certain regions, most notably the American West, and we have yet to learn much about the impact of gender and class on the shaping of contemporary black urban communities. We should use this seminar, and particularly the papers that will come from it, as the opportunity to expand our knowledge of those and other specific areas of the urban past.
SEMINAR READINGS:
Selecting important and yet available books and articles for a seminar is always a daunting task. I have tried, within the limits of our institutional and personal resources, to include the best of the methodologically and theoretically critical works now extant in African American urban history. All of the assigned book chapters and articles are on electronic reserve through the UW Libraries but given their widespread availability and affordable prices through Amazon.com and other outlets, I recommend that you purchase used copies whenever possible. You may also access journal articles directly from the periodicals section in the Suzzallo Library general collection. Unless otherwise indicated, each book or article that appears on the weekly reading schedule should be read in its entirety.
GRADING
Your seminar grade will be based upon three components: your leadership of your assigned seminar (30%) the quality of your participation in weekly discussions (20%) and the quality of your research paper (50%).
Required Books (on Library Reserve)
Martha Biondi, To Stand and Fight: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Postwar New York City (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2003)
Leslie Brown, Upbuilding Black Durham: Gender, Class, and Black Community Development in the Jim Crow South (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2008)
Matthew J. Countryman, Up South: Civil Rights and Black Power in Philadelphia (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006)
Douglas Flamming, Bound for Freedom: Black Los Angeles in Jim Crow America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005)
James Gregory, The Southern Diaspora: How the Great Migrations of Black and White Southerners Transformed America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005)
Annelise Orleck, Storming Caesars Palace: How Black Mothers Fought Their Own War on Poverty (Boston: Beacon Press, 2005)
Kimberley L. Phillips, AlabamaNorth: African American Migrants, Community, and Working-Class Activism in Cleveland, 1915-45 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1999)
Bernard E. Powers, Jr., Black Charlestonians: A Social History, 1822-1885 (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1994)
Robert O. Self, American Babylon: Race and the Struggle for Postwar Oakland (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003)
Matthew C. Whitaker, Race Work: The Rise of Civil Rights in the Urban West (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2005)
Andrew Wiese, Places of Their Own: African American Suburbanization in the Twentieth Century (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004)
WEEKLY READING ASSIGNMENTS:
Oct. 3: INTRODUCTION: DISCUSSION AND DETERMINATION OF THE WEEKLY SEMINAR ASSIGNMENTS
NOTE: Please read the volume introduction to each of the works assigned below as well as the chapters listed, to get a sense of the entire work.
Oct. 10: THE 19th CENTURY
Bernard E. Powers, Jr., Black Charlestonians, Chapters 1-2.
Leslie Brown, Upbuilding Black Durham, Prologue, Chapters 1-3
Oct. 17: (No Class Today)
Oct. 24: THE GREAT MIGRATION: 1915-1940
James Gregory, The Southern Diaspora, Chapter 4
Kimberley Phillips, AlabamaNorth, Chapters 1, 5
Douglas Flamming, Bound for Freedom, Chapters 1-2, 8
Oct. 31: WORLD WAR II AND THE 1950s
Martha Biondi, To Stand and Fight, Chapters 4, 6
Matthew Countryman, Up South, Chapter 2
Nov.7: CIVIL RIGHTS, BLACK POWER & URBAN AMERICA
Matthew Countryman, Up South, Chapters 3, 5, 7
Robert Self, American Babylon, Chapters 6-8
Nov. 14: URBAN BLACK AMERICA IN A CONSERVATIVE ERA
Annelise Orleck, Storming Caesars Palace, Chapters 5-6, 9
Andrew Wiese, Places of Their Own, Chapters 8-9
Matthew Whitaker, Race Work, Chapter 7
Nov. 21: No Class Meeting, Prepare Research Papers
Nov. 28: No Class Meeting, Prepare Research Papers
Dec. 5: Final Meeting, Discuss Research & Writing Progress
