Learning about Black History Month

This marked celebration of African-American history initially began back in the 1920’s as several groups and individuals began holding Negro History Weeks and Negro Achievement Weeks. One of the individuals whose name comes to the forefront in efforts to raise awareness of the importance of African-Americans in history to a national level is Dr. Carter Godwin Woodson. This gentleman was a son of former slaves who eventually attained a Ph.D. from Harvard. He established the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (now called the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History) and launched the Journal of Negro History. He sought to broaden the scope of what were initially local celebrations to an event that would take place on a national level.

Woodson initially choose for the event to take place over the second week of February, which eventually was lengthened to include the whole month. The original week was chosen as is marks the birthdays of both Frederick Douglas and Abraham Lincoln. The celebration eventually adopted the title Black History Month in 1976 and it may also be referred to as African-American History Month and African Heritage Month.

Canada and the United Kingdom both celebrate Black History Months in February and October respectively.

Below are just a few websites that have extensive webliographies on African-American history/Black Studies. Since this the web page for the government documents department most of the webliographies represent information found at government websites. Many, many more websites containing information regarding African-American history may be found by searching in a search engine like Google or Yahoo.

The National Archives-Archives Library Information Center (ALIC)
http://www.archives.gov/research/alic/reference/black-history.html

Webliography by City College of New York
developed by the chief of the Reference & Government Documents Divisions
http://origin.admin.ccny.cuny.edu/library/blacks.html

Webliography by Evergreen State College, Daniel J. Evans Library,
staff of the Government Documents/Maps Division.
http://govdocs.evergreen.edu/hotopics/blackhistory.html