Introduction to African American History: Black Americans and the World

Catalog description

Exploring the history of Black Americans requires a global perspective. Beginning with early modern African civilizations, the transatlantic slave trade, the global age of revolutions, the implementation of transnational regimes of racial segregation, to the growth of transnational movements for civil and human rights, this course surveys the history of Black Americans from a global perspective. It analyzes how Black Americans conceived of their social position in relation to others in the world. It also explores how perspectives from across the world made sense of Black Americans. This course will follow African-descended people as they theorized, moved, migrated, and traveled throughout the world. From this perspective, students will learn about the diasporic dimensions of Black American identity. Students will also trace the historical circulation of African-descended people, knowledge, culture, and technologies. Students will analyze the important themes of freedom, movement, and migration from a global perspective. Through this course, students will learn that Black American historical actors have and continue to understand their position not only within the domestic social and political spheres of the United States but also in the global order of states and societies. From their marginalized social position, Black Americans, therefore, have articulated alternative frameworks for understanding the United States, the West, and the world. This is an introductory survey course. This course fulfills Dietrich College's "Intercultural and Global Inquiry" general education requirement.