Start Here!
This guide is a good starting place for most people doing research on various African and African American Studies topics.  Here is a good, basic formula for getting started with your research.

Begin your search with a library catalog (OBIS, OhioLINK and/or WorldCat) to find books and reference sources.   Why?  They:  

  • provide Background and Context
  • review and SUMMARIZE earlier work
  • often have chapters or sections which help you FOCUS your topic
  • provide CITATIONS to important books, journal articles, conference papers, interviews, etc.

Next, search research databases to find articles. The Library has hundreds of databases available, but the ones listed below are good places to begin.

Finally, you may wish to use Google or Google Scholar to search the Internet.  Take advantage of Google's advanced search features!

This is only a starting point.  Feel free to contact me if you have questions.  You may also schedule an appointment with a librarian for help with finding resources, planning a research strategy or getting to the next stage of your research.

All Items by Source Type

Biographical Sources

African American Lives
Print Location: Main Reference E185.96 .A446 2004
OBIS record

African Leaders: Guiding the New Millennium
Print Location: Main Reference DT18 .R344 2001
OBIS record

Notable African American Writers
Print Location: Main Reference PS153.N5 N68 2006
OBIS record

Notable Caribbeans and Caribbean Americans: A Biographical Dictionary
Print Location: Main Reference CT329 .M46 2003
OBIS record

The Historymakers Resource contains images Resource contains video Resource contains audio
The HistoryMakers is dedicated to preserving African American history as the missing link in American history. Focused on American history, oral history and education in general and more specifically on African American history, education, music, law, the arts, science, technology, media, medicine, entertainment, fashion & beauty, business, the military, politics and sports, The History Makers is a combination archive, library, museum, stock footage collection, on-line educator and educational PBS/TV programming. Its topics include but are not limited to African American organizations and associations, slavery, reconstruction, the labor movement, the civil rights movement and black authors.

Databases

Academic Search Complete Restricted Resource Some full text available
Covers scholarly journals and popular magazines on nearly every subject. Includes full text of many articles.

African American Periodicals (1825-1995) Restricted Resource Some full text available
Features more than 170 wide-ranging periodicals by and about African Americans. Published in 26 states, the publications include academic and political journals, commercial magazines, institutional newsletters, organizations' bulletins, annual reports and other genres.

African American Poetry, 1760-1900 Restricted Resource Some full text available
Includes the full text of almost 3000 poems written by African-American poets in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. African-American Poetry is a resource for literary scholars and for researchers in black studies, linguistics, women's studies, black literary heritage, and comparative studies. The poetry explores a multitude of topics, including abolition, children, civil rights, dreams, education, fugitive slave law, Indian raids, liberty, political issues, prejudice, and slavery. The variety of poem types is equally broad.

Aluka Restricted Resource Some full text available Resource contains images
An online digital library of scholarly resources from and about Africa.

America: History and Life Restricted Resource
Covers the history and culture of the United States and Canada, from prehistory to the present. Indexes articles and book reviews from more than 1,700 journals.  Strong English-language journal coverage is balanced by an international perspective on topics and events, including abstracts in English of articles published in more than 40 languages.

Dates of Coverage:  1964-


American History in Video Restricted Resource Resource contains video
Includes documentaries, newsreels, archival footage, and public affairs videos.
Black Studies Center Restricted Resource Some full text available Resource contains images Resource contains video
Black Studies Center is international in scope and multidisciplinary, spanning cultural, economic, historical, religious, social, and political issues of vital importance to the Black Studies discipline. Also includes the full text backfile (1935 to 1975) of the influential black newspaper The Chicago Defender, as well as in-depth essays accompanied by detailed timelines along with important research articles, images, film clips and more.
JSTOR Restricted Resource Some full text available
  • Search full-text articles in core scholarly journals throughout multiple fields.
  • It's an archive: most titles lack entries from the past 2-5 years.

Literary Reference Center Restricted Resource
Literary Reference Center is a comprehensive database that provides a broad spectrum of information on thousands of authors and their works across literary disciplines and timeframes. LRC combines information from major respected reference works, books, literary journals as well as original content from EBSCO Publishing. LRC includes:
  • plot summaries, synopses and work overviews
  • articles of literary criticism
  • full text of literary journals
  • author biographies
  • book reviews
  • author interviews
  • and images of key literary figures

LRC also includes full text of selected classic and contemporary poems and short stories. Full text of classic novels is anticipated by Fall 2006. As reference material, LRC includes full text of a number of literary encyclopedia and guides.


Literature Resource Center Restricted Resource
Full-text database that includes author biographies and work overviews, literary criticism, and indexed books, essays, and articles on world literature. 


MLA International Bibliography Restricted Resource
Index to books, essays, and journal articles on modern languages, literatures, folklore and linguistics. Topics include literary theory, criticism, folk literature and belief systems, linguistics, semantics, translation, dramatic arts, and history of printing and publishing. Covers literature worldwide and includes materials in all genres and in foreign languages.
Dates of Coverage: 1926-

National Underground Railroad Freedom Center Resource contains images
National Underground Railroad Freedom Center provides a collection of digital documents related to slavery, abolition, and emancipation. The collection includes abolitionist broadsheets, photographs by Matthew Brady, letters and speeches of President Lincoln and other presidents, and other historic letters, documents, and pictures.

Oxford African American Studies Center Restricted Resource Some full text available
Features over 7,500 articles from Oxford's reference works, approximately 100 primary sources with specially written commentaries, over 1,300 images, over 100 maps, over 200 charts and tables, timelines to guide researchers through the history of African Americans and over 6,000 biographies. The core content includes: Africana, which presents an account of the African and African American experience in five volumes ; the Encyclopedia of African American history ; Black women in America, 2nd ed ; and the African American national biography.
Oxford Reference Restricted Resource Some full text available
Over 100 dictionaries, general reference, language reference, and subject reference works from Oxford University Press.

Slavery and Anti-Slavery: A Transnational Archive. Part I: Debates over Slavery and Abolition Restricted Resource Some full text available
Slavery and Anti-Slavery: A Transnational Archive. Part I: Debates over Slavery and Abolition In addition to newspaper collections and books published in the antebellum era, Slavery and Anti-Slavery contains documents from several archives originally available only on microfilm. This first iteration, Debates over Slavery and Abolition, contains over 1.5 million searchable pages from more than 7,000, 80 serials, more than fifteen manuscript collections, & court records, as well as reference materials. Material published through partnerships with the Amistad Research Center, Oberlin College, Oxford University, & many other institutions
note: Access may be discontinued in the near future; contact library staff if you have questions about it

Dictionaries & Thesauri

Historical Dictionary of African American Cinema
Print Location: Main Reference PN1995.9.N4 B433 2007
OBIS record

Historical Dictionary of South Africa
Print Location: Main Reference DT1772 .S38 2000
OBIS record

The Dictionary of Contemporary Politics of Central America and the Caribbean
Print Location: Main Reference F2183.G86 1991
OBIS record

Encyclopedias

Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African American Experience
Print Location: Main Reference DT14 .A37435 2005
OBIS record

Encyclopedia of African American History 1619-1895: From the Colonial Period to the Age of Frederick Douglass
Print Location: Main Reference E185 .E545 2006
OBIS record

Encyclopedia of African American History 1896 to the Present: From the Age of Segregation to the Twenty-First Century
Print Location: Main Reference E185 .E5453 2009
OBIS record

Encyclopedia of African American Popular Culture
Print Location: Main Reference E174 .E54 2011
OBIS record

Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History Restricted Resource
A five-volume set and supplement covering all aspects of the African-American experience from 1619 to the present day. Using biographies, historical essays, and thematic pieces, many written by foremost scholars, it addresses a wide array of subjects in over 2,300 articles to define in one source the cultural roots, participation in American life, and current condition of the African-American community.

note: This is an online version of a print source.
Encyclopedia of Slave Resistance and Rebellion
Print Location: Main Reference E447 .E53 2007
OBIS record

Handbooks & Guides

The Government and Politics of the Middle East and North Africa
Print Location: Main Reference DS62.8 .G68 2011
OBIS record

The Oxford Companion to African American Literature
Print Location: Main Reference PS153.N5 O96 1997
OBIS record

Journals

Africa Knowledge Project Restricted Resource
Africa Knowledge Project, known as AKP, promotes Critical African Studies. It disseminates Africa-centered, evidence-based knowledge on Africa and African Diaspora. Includes access to the following journals:

African journal of criminology and justice studies v.1 (2005)-
African music database
African philosophy v.1 (2002)-
Biafran War database
Enriching Resource on African Languages Database
Ijele v.1 (2000)-
JENdA v.1 (2001)-
Kiswahili story database
ProudFlesh v.1 (2002)-
West Africa review v.1 (1999)-

Journal of African American Studies Restricted Resource
The Journal of African American Studies examines topics concerning social transformations that impact the life chances of continental Africans and the African diaspora. It publishes original research on issues of professional and disciplinary concern for the social progress of people of African descent. The journal features empirical, methodological, and theoretical papers as well as literary criticism. It covers the full spectrum of this interdisciplinary field, containing diverse methods and perspectives that include anthropology, art, economics, law, literature, management science, political science, psychology, sociology, social policy research, and others.

Journal of Black Studies Restricted Resource
Journal of Black Studies is a bimonthly peer-reviewed academic journal that publishes papers in the fields of social sciences and ethnic studies concerning African-American culture. The journal's editors-in-chief are Molefi Kete Asante (Temple University) and Ama Mazama (Temple University). The journal was established in 1970 and is currently published by SAGE Publications.

Organizations & Associations

African Studies Association
Established in 1957, the African Studies Association is the largest organization with a global membership devoted to enhancing the exchange of information about Africa. The African Studies Association encourages the production and dissemination of knowledge about Africa, past and present. Based in the United States, the ASA supports understanding of an entire continent in each facet of its political, economic, social, cultural, artistic, scientific, and environmental landscape. Its members include scholars, students, teachers, activists, development professionals, policymakers and donors.

Association for the Study of African American Life and History
The mission of the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) is to promote, research, preserve, interpret and disseminate information about Black life, history and culture to the global community. The vision of the ASALF is to be the premier Black Heritage learned society with a strong network of national and international branches and partners whose diverse and inclusive membership will continue the legacy of its founder, Dr. Carter G. Wilson.

National Association of African American Studies
The National Association of African American Studies and Affiliates (NAAAS) was founded in 1992 on the campus of Virginia State University in Petersburg, Virginia. The overarching goal of the organization was directed toward providing faculty and students an opportunity to engage in scholarly endeavors. This goal has been expanded and the following goals are the foundation from which the organization derives its directions and actions: To serve as a resource for scholars in the field who desire information and support for research related to the African and African American, Hispanic, Latino(a) and Chicano(a), Native American and Asian experiences.

W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research
The W. E. B. Du Bois Institute is the nation’s oldest research center dedicated to the study of the history, culture, and social institutions of Africans and African Americans. Named after the first African American to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard University, William Edward Burghardt Du Bois (1895), the Institute was established in May 1975 to create fellowships that would “facilitate the writing of doctoral dissertations in areas related to Afro- American Studies.” The Du Bois Institute’s research projects and visiting fellows form the vital nucleus around which revolve a stimulating array of lecture series, art exhibitions, readings, conferences, and archival and publication projects.

Primary Sources

African American Newspapers (1827-1998) Restricted Resource Some full text available
Provides online access to approximately 270 U.S. newspapers chronicling a century and a half of the African American experience. This unique collection features papers from more than 35 states — including many rare and historically significant 19th century titles.

Dates of Coverage: 1827-1998


American Memory Resource contains images Resource contains audio
American Memory provides free and open access through the Internet to written and spoken words, sound recordings, still and moving images, prints, maps, and sheet music that document the American experience. It is a digital record of American history and creativity. These materials, from the collections of the Library of Congress and other institutions, chronicle historical events, people, places, and ideas that continue to shape America, serving the public as a resource for education and lifelong learning.
Ethnic NewsWatch Restricted Resource Some full text available
Ethnic NewsWatch includes journals, magazines, and newspapers from ethnic and minority presses, providing researchers access to essential, often overlooked perspectives. The complete Ethnic NewsWatch provides a full-text collection of more than 2.5 million articles from over 330 titles.  Ethnicities include: African American/Caribbean/African; Arab/Middle Eastern; Asian/Pacific Islander; European/Eastern European; Hispanic; Jewish; Native People.

Dates of Coverage: 1959-

NAACP Papers Restricted Resource
Nearly 2 million digitized pages of internal memos, legal briefings, and direct action summaries from national, legal, and branch offices throughout the country. It charts the NAACP's work and covers issues including: lynching, school desegregation, and discrimination in the military, the criminal justice system, employment, and housing, among others. It provides a comprehensive view of the NAACP's evolution, policies, and achievements from 1909-1970.

Web Sites

Black Abolitionist Digital Archive Some full text available Resource contains images Resource contains audio
 The Black Abolitionist Digital Archive is a collection of over 800 speeches by antebellum blacks and approximately 1,000 editorials from the period. These important documents provide a portrait of black involvement in the anti-slavery movement; scans of these documents are provided as images and PDF files.
BlackPast.org
This site provides "reference materials to the general public on six centuries of African American history. It includes an online encyclopedia of hundreds of famous and lesser known figures in African America, full text primary documents and major speeches of black activists and leaders from the 18th Century to the present." Searchable, or browse encyclopedia articles about people, places, churches, events, and organizations.
Civil Rights Digital Library
Documents the struggle for racial equality in the 1950s and 1960s through a digital video archive of historical news film, extensive links to related digital collections, and secondary Web-based learning resources such as contextual stories, encyclopedia articles, lesson plans, and activities.
Digital Schomburg
Digital Schomburg provides access to trusted information, interpretation and scholarship on the global black experience. Users worldwide can find exhibitions, books, articles, photographs, prints, audio and video streams, and selected external links for research in the history and cultures of the peoples of Africa and the African Diaspora. 
note: Digital Schomburg is a service of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and the New York Public Library.
Oberlin College Department of African American Studies
The official website of the African American Studies department of Oberlin College.

The African-American Mosaic
This exhibit marks the publication of The African-American Mosaic: A Library of Congress Resource Guide for the Study of Black History and Culture. A noteworthy and singular publication, the Mosaic is the first Library-wide resource guide to the institution's African- American collections. Covering the nearly 500 years of the black experience in the Western hemisphere, the Mosaic surveys the full range size, and variety of the Library's collections, including books, periodicals, prints, photographs, music, film, and recorded sound.

The Malcolm X Project at Columbia University
Since its inception in 2001, the Malcolm X Project at Columbia University has been concerned primarily with gathering and illuminating new research about El Hajj Malik el-Shabazz through two major initiatives: 1) the construction of a robust, web-based, multimedia version of the Autobiography of Malcolm X, and 2) the research and development of a biography of Malcolm X written by Dr. Manning Marable, the project's director.

The Martin Luther King Jr. Research and Education Institute
Building upon the achievements of Stanford University’s Martin Luther King, Jr., Papers Project, the King Research and Education Institute provides an institutional home for a broad range of activities illuminating the Nobel Peace laureate’s life and the movements he inspired. The Institute’s endowment supports programs that serve as an enduring link between Stanford’s research resources and King’s dream of global peace with social justice.
The Story of Africa
The Story of Africa tells the history of the continent from an African perspective. Africa's top historians take a fresh look at the events and characters that have shaped the continent from the origins of humankind to the end of South African apartheid.
Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database
The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database has information on almost 35,000 slaving voyages that forcibly embarked over 10 million Africans for transport to the Americas between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. It offers researchers, students and the general public a chance to rediscover the reality of one of the largest forced movements of peoples in world history.
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Acknowledgments
This guide created by Maryann Penzvalto, Kent State University, School of Library and Information Science.
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