Primary Sources in African American Literature

Angelou, Maya.  I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.  1969.  New York: Bantam Books, 1997.

Baldwin, James. Nobody Knows My Name.  1954.  New York: Vintage International, 1993.

___.  Notes of a Native Son.  1955.  Boston: Beacon Press, 1984. 

Bambara, Toni Cade.  The Salt Eaters.  New York: Random House, 1980. 

Baraka, Amiri.  Dutchman, and the Slave: Two Plays by LeRoi Jones.  1964.  New York: Perennial Books, 2001.

___.  The System of Dante’s Hell.  1963.  The Fiction of LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka.  Chicago: Laurence Hill Books, 2000.

Bennett, Gwendolyn B. “Hatred.”  The Norton Anthology of African American Literature.  1923.  Henry Louis Gates, and Nellie Y. McKay, eds.  2^nd ed.  New York:  W.W. Norton & Co., Inc., 2004.

___.  “Heritage.”  The Norton Anthology of African American Literature.  1923.  Henry Louis Gates, and Nellie Y. McKay, eds.  2^nd ed.  New York:  W.W. Norton & Co., Inc., 2004.

___.  “To a Dark Girl.”  The Norton Anthology of African American Literature.  1923.  Henry Louis Gates, and Nellie Y. McKay, eds.  2^nd ed.  New York:  W.W. Norton & Co., Inc., 2004.

Bibb, Henry.  Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, An American Slave.  1849.  I Was Born a Slave: An Anthology of Classic Slave Narratives, 1849-1866.  Yuval Taylor, ed.  Chicago: Laurence Hill Books, 1999.

Bontemps, Arna.  Black Thunder: Gabriel’s Revolt, Virginia, 1800.  1936.  Boston: Beacon Press, 1992.

Brown, Claude.  Manchild in the Promised Land.  1965.  New York: Touchtone, 1993.

Brooks, Gwendolyn.  Blacks.  Chicago: Third World Press, 1987.

Brown, William Wells.  Clotel, or, The President’s Daughter.  1853.  New York: Penguin Books, 2004.

Butler, Octavia.  Kindred.  Boston: Beacon Press, 1988.

Chesnutt, Charles.  The House Behind the Cedars.  1900.  New York: Penguin Books, 1993.

___.  The Marrow of Tradition.  1901.  Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s Press, 2002.

___.  The Journals of Charles W. Chesnutt.  Richard Brodhead, ed.  Durham, NC: Duke UP, 1993.

___.  The Wife of His Youth and Other Stories of the Color Line, and Selected Essays.  Teddington, Middlesex: The Echo Library, 2007.

___.  To Be an Author: Letters of Charles W. Chesnutt, 1889-1905.  Joseph R. McElrath, Jr., and Robert C. Leitz, III, eds.  Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1997.

Cleaver, Eldridge.  Soul on Ice.  1968.  New York: Delta Books, 1999.

Churchill, Ward, and Jim Vander Wall.  The COINTELPRO Papers.  1990.  Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 2002.

Cooper, Anna Julia.  A Voice from the South.  1892.  Oxford: Oxford UP, 1988.

Cullen, Countee.  Many-Colored Coat of Dreams: The Poetry of Countee Cullen.  Houston Baker, ed.  New York: Boradside Press, 1974. 

Delaney, Martin.  Blake, or the Huts of America: A Tale of the Mississippi Valley, the Southern United States, and Cuba.  1859.  Boston: Beacon Press, 1970.

___.  The Condition, Elevation, Emigration and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States.  1852.  Baltimore: Black Classic Press, 1993.

Douglass, Frederick.  My Bondage and My Freedom.  1855.  New York: Dover Publications, 1969.

___.   The Heroic Slave.  1853.  Three Classic African-American Novels.  William L. Andrews, ed.  New York: Mentor, 1990.

___.  The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave, Written by Himself.  1845.  New York: Penguin Books, 1982.

___.  Frederick Douglass: Selected Speeches and Writings.  Chicago: Lawrence Hill Press, 1999.

Du Bois, W.E.B.  The Souls of Black Folk.  1903.  Three Negro Classics.  New York: Avon Books, 1965.

Dumas, Henry.  Echo Tree: The Collected Short Fiction of Henry Dumas.  Minneapolis: Coffee House Press, 2003.

Dunbar, Paul Laurence.  The Collected Poetry of Paul Laurence Dunbar.   Richmond: UP of VA, 1993.

Ellison, Ralph.  Invisible Man.  1947.  New York: Vintage Books, 1990.

El-Shabazz, El-Hajj Malik.  The Autobiography of Malcolm X.  1964.  New York: Ballentine Books, 1999.

Equiano, Olaudah.  The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African.  1789.  I Was Born a Slave: An Anthology of Classic Slave Narratives, 1772-1849.  Chicago: Laurence Hill Books, 1999.

Garnet, Henry Highland.  An Address to the Slaves of the United States of America.  1848.  The Norton Anthology of African American Literature.  Henry Louis Gates, Jr., and Nellie Y. McKay, eds.  2^nd ed.  New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2004.

Griggs, Sutton.  Imperium and Imperio: A Study of the Negro Race Problem, A Novel.  1899.  North Stradford, NH: Ayer Co., 2001.

Hammon, Briton.  A Narrative of the Uncommon Sufferings and Surprising Deliverance of Briton Hammon, a Negro man,--Servant to Gernal Winslow of Marshfield, in New England.  1760.  Black Writers in Britain, 1760-1890: An Anthology.  Paul Edwards and David Dabydeen, eds.  Edinburg, Scotland: Edinburg UP, 1995.

Hansberry, Lorraine.  A Raisin in the Sun: The Unfilmed Original Screenplay.  New York: Signet Books, 1992.

Harper, Frances E. W.  Iola Leroy.   1892. The African American Novel in the Age of Reaction: Three Classics.  William L. Andrews, ed.  New York: Mentor, 1992.

Hayden, Robert.  Collected Poems.  New York: Liveright Publishing, 1997.

Himes, Chester.  If He Hollers Let Him Go.  1945.  New York: Vintage Books, 1988.

Hopkins, Pauline.  Contending Forces: A Romance Illustrative of Negro Life North and South.  1900.  New York: Oxford UP, 1991.

Hughes, Langston.  Vintage Langston.  New York: Vintage Books, 2004.

Hurston, Zora Neal.  Their Eyes Were Watching God: A Novel.  1937.  New York: Negro UP, 1969.

Jacobs, Harriet.  Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.  1861.  Classic African American Women’s Narratives.  William L. Andrews, ed.  Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003.

Johnson, Charles.  Middle Passage.  New York: Plume Books, 1990.

Johnson, James Weldon.  The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man.  1927.  New York: Vintage Books, 1989.

Kincaid, Jamaica.  At the Bottom of the River.  New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2000.

Larson, Nella.  The Complete Fiction of Nella Larson: Passing, Quicksand, and the Stories.  1928.  New York: Anchor Books, 2001.

Marshall, Paule.  Brown Girl, Brownstones.  New York: Feminist Press, 1996.

Martin, Valerie.  Property: A Novel.  New York: Vintage, 2003.

McKay, Claude.  Banjo.  1929.  New York: Harvest Books, 1970.

Morrison, Toni.  Beloved.  1987.  New York: Plume Books, 1988.

Naylor, Gloria.  Linden Hills.  New York: Penguin, 1986.

___.  The Women of Brewster Place.  New York: Penguin, 1983.

Neal, Larry.  Hoodo Hollerin’ Be Bop Ghosts.  Washington, D.C.: Howard UP, 1974.

Newton, Huey P.  To Die for My People.   1972.  New York: Writers and Readers Pub. Inc., 1999.

Northup, Solomon.  Twelve Years a Slave.  1853.  I Was Born a Slave: An Anthology of Classic Slave Narratives, 1849-1866.  Yuval Taylor, ed.  Chicago: Laurence Hill Books, 1999.

Petry, Anne.  The Street: A Novel.  1946.  Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1974.

Prince, Mary.  The History of Mary Prince, A West Indian Slave.  1831.  Six Women’s Slave Narratives.  William L. Andrews, ed.  Oxford: Oxford UP, 1988.

Reed, Ishmael.  Flight to Canada.  New York: Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1976.

Sanchez, Sonia.  Shake Loose My Skin.  Boston: Beacon Press, 2000.

Shange, Ntozake.  for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow if enuf.  1975.  New York: Scribner Poetry, 1997.

Schuyler, George S.  Black No More: A Novel.  New York: Modern Library, 1999.

Thurman, Wallace.  The Blacker the Berry.  1929.  New York: Scribner Paperback Fiction, 1996.

Toomer, Jean.  Cane.  1923.  New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1993.

Turner, Nat.  The Confessions of Nat Turner, the Leader of the Late Insurrection in Southhampton, VA.  1831.  I Was Born a Slave: An Anthology of Classic Slave Narratives, 1772-1849.  Taylor, Yuval, ed.  Chicago: Laurence Hill Books, 1999.

Ture, Kwame.  Black Power: The Politics of Liberation.  1967.  New York: Vintage Books, 1992.

Walker, Alice.  The Color Purple.  Orlando, FL: Harvest Books, 1982.

Walker, David.  Walker’s Appeal, In Four Articles, Together with a Preamble, to the Coloured Citizens of the World.  1830.   Peter P. Hinks, ed.  University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State UP, 2000.

Washington, Booker T.  Up From Slavery.  1901.  Three Negro Classics.  New York: Avon Books, 1965.

Wells-Barnett, Ida B.  A Red Record.  1895.  Southern Horrors and Other Writings: The Anti-Lynching Campaign of Ida B. Wells, 1892-1900.  Jacqueline Jones Royster, ed.  Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s Press, 1997. 

Wheatley, Phillis.  The Poems of Phillis Wheatley.  Charlotte, NC: University of NC Press, 1989.

Wilson, August.  The Piano Lesson.  New York: Plume Books, 1990.

Wilson, Harriet.  Our Nig; or, Sketches from the Life of a Free Black, in a Two-Story White House, North. 1859.  New York: Vintage Books.  1983.

Wright, Richard.  Native Son.  1940.  New York: Perennial Classics, 1998.

___.  Uncle Tom’s Children.  1936-38.  New York: Harper Perennial, 1989.

 

Secondary Sources in Africana Studies

Andrews,William L.  To Tell a Free Story: The First Century of Afro-American Autobiography, 1760-1865.  Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1989.

___.  Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written by Himself: Norton Critical Edition.  New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1997.

Bay, Mia.  The White Image in the Black Mind: African-American Ideas about White People, 1830-1925.  New York: Oxford UP, 2000.

Berlin, Ira.  Slaves Without Masters: The Free Negro in the Antebellum South.  1974.  New York: The New Press, 1992.

Black, Daniel P.  Dismantling Black Manhood: An Historical and Literary Analysis of the Legacy of Slavery.  Levittown, PA: Garland Books, 1997.

Blassingame, John W.  The Slave Community: Plantation Life in the Antebellum South.  New York: Oxford UP, 1979.

Carby, Hazel.  Reconstructing Womanhood: The Emergence of the Afro-American Woman Novelist.  New York: Oxford UP, 1987.

Diedrich, Maria.  Love Across Color Lines: Atilie Assing and Frederick Douglass.  New York: Hill and Wang, 1999.

Elder, Arlene A.  The ‘Hindered Hand’: Cultural Implications of Early African-American Fiction.  Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1978.

Foster, Frances.  Witnessing Slavery: The Development of Antebellum Slave Narratives.  Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1979.

Garvey, Marcus.  The Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey.  Dover, MA: The Majority Press, 1986.

Gates, Jr., Henry Louis, and Terri Hume Oliver. The Souls of Black Folk: Norto Critical Edition.   New York, MA: W.W. Norton & Co., 1999.

Genovese, Eugene D.  Roll Jordan Roll: The World the Slaves Made.  New York: Vintage Books, 1976.

Giddings, Paula.  When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Sex in America.  New York: Perennial, 1984.

Kaplan, Carla.  Passing: Norton Critical Edition.  New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2007.

McKay, Nellie Y., and Francis Smith Foster, eds.  Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl: Norton Critical Edition.  New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2001.

Sanchez-Eppler, Karen.  Touching Liberty: Abolition, Feminism, and the Politics of the Body.  Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.

Stuckey, Sterling.  Slave Culture: Nationalist Theory and the Foundations of Black America.  New York: Oxford UP, 1987.

White, Deborah Gray.  Ar’n’t I a Woman?: Female Slaves in the Plantation South.  1985.  New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1999.

Woodson, Carter G.  The Mis-Education of the Negro.  1933.  Trenton, NJ: African World Press, 1998.

 

Cultural and Literary Theory

Babb, Valarie.  Whiteness Visible: The Meaning of Whiteness in American Literature and Culture.   New York: NYUP, 1998.

Bhabha, Homi.  Location of Culture.  London: Routledge, 1994.

Devere Brody,  Jennifer.  Impossible Purities: Blackness, Femininity, and Victorian Culture.  Durham, NC: Duke UP, 1998.

Butler, Judith.  The Psychic Life of Power: Theories in Subjection.  Stanford, CT: Stanford UP, 1997.

Fanon, Franz.  Black Skin, White Mask.  1952.  New York: Grove Press, 1967.

Gilroy, Paul.  The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double-Consciousness.  Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1993.

Harper, Phillip Brian.  Are We Not Men?: Masculine Anxiety and the Problem of African-American Identity.  New York: Oxford UP, 1996.

Hartman, Saidiya.  Scenes of Subjection: Terror, Slavery, and Self-Making in Nineteenth-Century America.  New York: Oxford UP, 1997.

Locke, Alain, ed.  The New Negro.   1925.  New York: Touchtone Books, 1997.

Morrison, Toni.  Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination.  New York: Vintage Press, 1993.

Sheshadri-Crooks, Kalpana.  Desiring Whiteness: A Lacanian Analysis of Race.  London: Routledge, 2000.

Spillers, Hortense J.  Black, White, and in Color: Essays on American Literature and Culture.  Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003.

 

Black Journals 1833 – 1960

African: A Journal of African Affairs. (Universal Ethiopian Students’ Association). Vols. 1–6/No. 5 (all publ.). New York, 1937–1948. 1 reel.

Alexander’s Magazine. Vols. 1–7 (all publ.). Boston, 1905–1909. 29 microfiche.

American Anti-Slavery Reporter. (American Anti-Slavery Society). Nos. 1–8 (all publ.). New York, 1834. 2 microfiche.

American Anti-Slavery Society. Annual Report. Nos. 1–28 (all publ.; Nos. 8–21 never publ.). New York, 1834–1860. 1 reel.

American Colonization Society. Annual Report. 1st–91st/93rd (all publ.). Washington, D.C., 1818–1908/1910. 3 reels.

American Jubilee. Nos. 1–12 (all publ.). New York, 1854–1855. 2 microfiche.
Anti-Slavery Examiner. (American Anti-Slavery Society). Nos. 1–14 (all publ.). New York, 1836–1845. 17 microfiche.

Anti-Slavery Record. (American Anti-Slavery Society). Vols. 1–3 (all publ.). New York, 1835–1837. 6 microfiche.

Anti-Slavery Tracts. (American Anti-Slavery Society). Series 1: Nos. 1–20 (all publ.), 1855–1856; Series 2: Nos. 1–25 (all and last publ.), 1860–1861. New York, 1855–1861. 16 microfiche.

African Observer: A Monthly Journal…Illustrative of the General Character, and Moral and Political Effects of Negro Slavery. Nos. 1–12 (all publ.). Philadelphia, 1827–1828. 4 microfiche.

Brown American. (National Association of Negroes in American Industries). Vols. 1–5/No. 8, continued as years 1941–1945 (all publ.). Philadelphia, 1936–1945. 12 microfiche.

Color Line: A Monthly Round-Up of the Facts of Negro American Progress and of the Growth of American Democracy. Vols. 1–2/No. 6 (all publ.). Mt. Vernon, N.Y., 1946–1947. 1 microfiche.

Colored American Magazine. Vols. 1–17/No. 5 (all publ.). Boston, New York, 1900–1909. 89 microfiche.

Competitor. Vols. 1–3/No. 4 (all publ.). Pittsburgh, 1920–1921. 11 microfiche.

Crisis: A Record of the Darker Races. (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People). Vols. 1–47. New York, 1910–1940. 173 microfiche.

Douglass’ Monthly. Vols. 1–5 (all publ.). Rochester, N.Y., 1858–1863. 9 microfiche.

Education: A Journal of Reputation. (Negro Needs Society). Vols. 1–2/No. 4 (all publ.). New York, 1935–1936. 2 microfiche.

Fire!! Devoted to Younger Negro Artists. Vol. 1/No. 1 (all publ.). New York, 1926. 1 microfiche.

Freedman. (American Tract Society). Vols. 1–6/No. 3 (all publ.). Boston, 1864–1869. 1 reel.
Freedman’s Advocate. (National Freedman’s Relief Association). Vols. 1–2/No. 1 (all publ.). New York, 1864–1865. 1 reel.

Freedman’s Journal. (American Tract Society). Vols. 1–2 (all publ.). Boston, 1865–1866. 1 reel.

Half-Century Magazine. Vols. 1–18/No. 1 (all publ.). Chicago, 1916–1925. 1 reel.

Harlem Quarterly. Nos. 1–4 (all publ.). New York, 1949–1950. 2 microfiche.

Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. Annual Report and Proceedings. Vols. 1–24 (all publ.). Boston, 1833–1856. 1 reel.

Messenger: World’s Greatest Negro Monthly. Vols. 1–10/No. 5 (all publ.). New York, 1917–1928. 33 microfiche.

National Anti-Slavery Standard. Vols. 1–30 (all publ.). New York, 1840–1870. 6 reels.

National Era. Vols. 1–24 (all publ.). Washington, D.C., 1847–1860. 4 reels.

National Freedman. (National Freedman’s Relief Association). Vols. 1–2/No. 9 (all publ.). New York, 1865–1866. 1 reel.

National Negro Health News. (U.S. Public Health Service). Vols. 1–18/No. 2 (all publ.). Washington, D.C., 1933–1950. style="font-size: 13pt; font-family: "Times New Roman";" lang="FR">26 microfiche.

National Negro Voice. Nos. 1–11 (all publ.). Kingston, Jamaica, 1941. 1 microfiche.

National Principia. Vols. 1–5/No. 27 (i.e., nos. 1–235; all publ.). New York, 1858–1866. 2 reels.

Negro Educational Review. (National Teacher’s Research Association). Vols. 1–16. Orangeburg, S.C., 1950–1965. 2 reels.

Negro Farmer and Messenger. Vols. 1–5/No. 1 (all publ.). Tuskegee, Ala., 1914–1918. 1 reel.

Negro Music Journal: A Monthly, Devoted to the Educational Interest of the Negro in Music. Vols. 1–2 (i.e., nos. 1–15; all publ.). Washington, D.C., 1902–1903. 5 microfiche.

Negro Quarterly: A Review of Negro Life and Culture. Nos. 1–4 (all publ.). New York, 1942–1943. 5 microfiche.

Negro Story: A Magazine for All Americans. Vols. 1–2/No. 3 (all publ.). Chicago, 1944–1946. 8 microfiche.

New Challenge. Vols. 1–2/No. 2 (all publ.). Boston, 1934–1937. 4 microfiche.

Ohio Anti-Slavery Society. Report of Anniversary. Vols. 1–4. Cincinnati, 1836–1840. 1 reel.

Quarterly Review of Higher Education among Negroes. Vols. 1–28. Charlotte, N.C., 1933–1960. 78 microfiche.

Race Relations: A Monthly Summary of Events and Trends. Vols. 1–5 (all publ.). Nashville, Tenn., 1943–1948. 23 microfiche.

Race: Devoted to Social, Political and Economic Equality. Nos. 1–2 (all publ.). New York, 1935–1936. 2 microfiche.

Radical Abolitionist. Vols. 1–4/No. 5 (all publ.). New York, 1855–1858. 4 microfiche.

Service. Vols. 1–18/No. 12 (all publ.). Tuskegee, Ala., 1936–1954. 8 reels.

Slavery in America: With Notices of the Present State of Slavery and the Slave Trade throughout the World. Nos. 1–14 (all publ.). London, 1836–1837. 4 microfiche.

Southern Frontier. (Commission on Interracial Cooperation). Vols. 1–6 (all publ.). Atlanta, 1940–1945. 4 microfiche.

The Non-Slaveholder. Series 1: Vols. 1–5 (all publ.). 1846–1850; Series 2: Vols. 1–2 (all and last publ.). 1853–1854. Philadelphia, 1846–1854. 20 microfiche.

Tuskegee Messenger. Vols. 1–12/No. 12 (all publ.). Tuskegee, Ala., 1924-1936. 2 reels.

Voice of the Negro. Vols. 1–4/No. 10 (all publ.). Atlanta, Chicago, 1904–1907. 42 microfiche.