University Libraries

By Kevin Cretsos

Every February during Black History Month, we honor the contributions of Black voices and experiences that have historically been marginalized and suppressed. Harvard scholar Carter G. Woodson dedicated his life toward highlighting the accomplishments of African Americans. In 1926, he led efforts to establish Negro History Week in the second week of February, which eventually helped designate February as Black History Month.

For 2024, the theme of Black History Month is African Americans and the Arts. This includes the impacts African Americans have had on visual arts, performing arts, music, literature, film, and other art forms throughout the Americas and the Caribbean.

In colonial America, enslaved people of African descent shared their artistry in craftsmanship and music, singing spirituals over the hardships of slavery. This music would influence musicians like Muddy Waters and the creation of other music genres like gospel, soul and the blues. 

In the 1920s, art flourished in Black communities through movements like the Harlem Renaissance with writers Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston. Jazz evolved with musicians like Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong.

During the civil rights struggles of the 1960s, Malcolm X was assassinated. The Black Arts Movement grew as a response, inspiring Black artists such as Amiri Baraka, Nikki Giovanni, Maya Angelou, Gwendolyn Brooks, and James Baldwin to create works fueled by political activism. 

This legacy of African American art has helped preserve traditions while empowering and inspiring future generations. To learn more about Black history of the arts, browse and read these suggested websites, books and databases.

Black History Month Websites

• UD Libraries guide to Black History Month
• Smithsonian’s events, resources, exhibitions, and podcasts
• National Museum of African American History & Culture

Books

• Rethinking America's Past: Voices from the Kinsey African American Art and History Collection, edited by Tim Gruenewald
• African American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era, and Beyond, by Richard J. Powell and Virginia M. Mecklenburg with contributions from Marcia Battle
• Chasing Me to My Grave: An Artist's Memoir of the Jim Crow South, by Winfred Rembert as told to Erin I. Kelly; foreword by Bryan Stevenson
• Sistuhs in the Struggle: An Oral History of Black Arts Movement Theater and Performance, by La Donna L. Forsgren
• Paul Laurence Dunbar: The Life and Times of a Caged Bird, by Gene Andrew Jarrett

eBooks (UD login required)

• The Routledge Companion to African American Art History, edited by Eddie Chambers
• African American Art: The Long Struggle, by Crystal A. Britton.
• Antagonistic Cooperation: Jazz, Collage, Fiction, and the Shaping of African American Culture, by Robert G. O’Meally
• A History of the Harlem Renaissance, edited by Rachel Farebrother and Miriam Thaggert
• The Black Experience in Design: Identity, Expression and Reflection, edited by Anne H. Berry, Kareem Collie, Penina Acayo Laker, Lesley-Ann Noel, Jennifer Rittner, Kelly Walters
• Toni Morrison: The Last Interview and Other Conversations with an introduction by Nikki Giovanni
• Dreaming Out Loud: African American Novelists at Work, edited by Horace Porter

Databases (UD login required)

• African American Music Reference
• African-American Poetry 1760-1900
• Black Thought and Culture

— Kevin Cretsos is a library systems support specialist and a member of the University Libraries Diversity and Inclusion Team.