Research Guides: Africology & African American Studies: Sources for research

Topic overview

Africana: the encyclopedia of the African and African American experience by Henry Louis Gates; Kwame Anthony Appiah
Call Number: DT14 .A37435 1999; REF 2nd Level West
Publication Date: 1999
This scholarly encyclopedia covers the entire history of Africa and the African Diaspora.
The African American Almanac (9th edtion)
Publication Date: 2003
The African American Almanac is a good starting place, and also a good last stop to check your facts (and spelling). Use the index to look up dates, names and events.
African American Studies by Jeanette R. Davidson (Editor)
Call Number: (E book)
Publication Date: 2010
This online book gives an overview of the sub-disciplines, perspectives and theoretical points of view in African American Studies.
The SAGE Encyclopedia of African Cultural Heritage in North America by Mwalimu J. Shujaa (Editor); Kenya J. Shujaa (Editor)
Call Number: (E book)
Publication Date: 2015
This online encyclopedia focuses on "the retention and continuity of African culture within the United States."

Databases for articles

Database list for Africology & African American Studies

Esearch This link opens in a new window
Search the library’s collection of books, articles, ebooks, dissertations, videos, music, and more.
Search Instruction: Finding Articles using Esearch
America: History and Life This link opens in a new window
Subjects: American History
Info type: scholarly articles, magazine articles, book & video info, dissertation info
SAGE Reference & Academic Ebooks This link opens in a new window
Selected Ebooks and reference sources from SAGE.
Subjects: Many subjects, including African American Studies, Anthropology, Business Ethics, Communication, Criminology, Economics, Education, Gender Studies, History, Politics, Psychology, Social Issues, Social Work, Sociology.
Info type: encyclopedia articles, ebooks

Reference Works

Towards an Understanding of Africology by Victor O. Okafor
Call Number: E184.7 .O39 2021
Authored by an EMU Professor
The Demise of the Inhuman by Ana Monteiro-Ferreira
Call Number: available online
Authored by an EMU Professor
Istwa Across the Water by Toni Pressley-Sanon
Authored by an EMU Professor
Encyclopedia of African American Education by Lomotey, Kofi
Call Number: Available online
Encyclopedia of African American Society by Jaynes, Gerald David
Call Number: Available online
Encyclopedia of Black Studies
by Asante, Molefi K.; Mazama, Ama
Call Number: available online
Print and eBook.
In Black and White
Call Number: REF Z1361.N39 S655
This periodical, only published in 1980, is an index of articles, news pieces, etc., by date. It is useful for finding news accounts. For example, what was in the news in 1975 about Detroit's Coleman Young? What news coverage was Thurgood Marshall receiving in the mid 1950s?

More Books on Africology
This search for the keyword Africology will get you started. Type in more keywords to focus.
Ebooks for AFC classes
This is a list of ebooks purchased by the Library because they are assigned in EMU classes.

Primary Sources

Black Abolitionist Archive - Univ. of Detroit Mercy
"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."

History Vault (via ProQuest) This link opens in a new window
Access digitized letters, papers, photographs, scrapbooks, financial records, diaries, government records and many more primary source materials. Collections include Civil Rights and Black Freedom Struggle; Southern Life, Slavery, and the Civil War; Women's Studies; International Relations; Military Conflicts; Early America.
Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture & Law This link opens in a new window
All known legal materials on slavery in the United States and the English-speaking world, as well as materials on free African-Americans in the colonies and the U.S. before 1870. Included are every statute passed by every state and colony, all federal statutes, all reported state and federal cases on slavery, and hundreds of books and pamphlets on the subject.
NOTE: The EMU Library does NOT subscribe to the HeinOnline collection materials listed under the tab Scholarly Articles & Other Documents.

Living Oral History Project
The Living Oral History Project is a partnership between the African American Cultural & Historical Museum of Washtenaw County and the Ann Arbor District Library
African American Cultural and Historical Museum of Washtenaw County
The AACHM mission is "to research, collect, preserve and exhibit cultural and historical materials about the life and work of African Americans in Washtenaw County."
Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress
"The Frederick Douglass Papers at the Library of Congress presents the papers of the nineteenth-century African American abolitionist who escaped from slavery and then risked his freedom by becoming an outspoken antislavery lecturer, writer, and publisher. The online collection, containing approximately 7,400 items (38,000 images), spans the years 1841-1964, with the bulk of the material dating from 1862 to 1865. Many of Douglass’s earlier writings were destroyed when his house in Rochester, New York, burned in 1872."
Short Term Offer: magazines related to BLM
Exact Editions has partnered with a number of publishers to assemble an extensive list of articles from archived digital issues in support of the Black Lives Matter movement, made freely available to view via the Exact Editions site.
more...less...
Note that most of the back issues of the magazines are NOT available - only the selected articles.
Digital Public Library of America
Access thousands of primary sources (images, documents, films, etc.). Browse by topic or refine a search by type, date, source, and subject.
BlackPast.org
An Online Reference Guide to African American and Global African History
Primary Sources in History: EMU Library Guide
A guide with links to history sources
Primary Sources in African History: EMU Library Guide
A guide with links to African history sources

Local News Sources

WEMU
MLive - Michigan
News Herald (Macomb, Oakland, etc.)
Eastern Echo
Google News Regional
Links to national and international news can be accessed through the navigation..

More guidance on news sources

Evaluating News Sources
by Sara Memmott Last Updated Jan 17, 2025 123 views this year

News and Current Events
by Kate Pittsley-Sousa Last Updated Jan 17, 2025 158 views this year

Interactive: Evaluating News Sources
This interactive lesson explores news sources - particularly, strategies that you can use to evaluate them. Consider these questions: What qualifies as news? Is all content published by a news agency really news? How does geography influence news coverage? What strategies should I use when evaluating news?

Social Sciences Librarian

Suzanne Gray

On Sabbatical Winter 2025

Subjects: African American Studies, Anthropology, Communication & Speech, Criminology, Sociology, Women's & Gender Studies

Get Research Help

Use 24/7 live chat below or:

In-person Help Winter 2025 Mon-Thur: 9am - 6pm

Email or phone replies

Appointments with librarians

Access Library and Research Help tutorials