African American Studies
Have Mercy Baby
Clyde McPhatter (1932–1972) was the golden voice behind a musical revolution—a soaring tenor whose electrifying performances helped define the sound of early rock ‘n’ roll. From his breakthrough with the Dom ...
Though There Be Giants
The African American Great Migration novel emerged as a popular mode of fiction in the 1920s. Not surprisingly, the decade that saw both the Harlem Renaissance as well as the thunderous onset of the Jazz ...
Jazz Odyssey
Booker T. Pittman (1909-1969) was a jazz saxophonist and clarinetist who played with greats like Louis Armstrong and Count Basie in the 1920s and 1930s. The maternal grandson of Booker T. Washington, ...
Mixing
Clyde Kennard (1927–1963) was a determined and soft-spoken man whose fight to enroll at Mississippi Southern College (now the University of Southern Mississippi) in the 1950s highlighted the broader struggle f ...
Jackson State University
Before it was Jackson State University®, it was Natchez Seminary, a school built on a vision of education and empowerment. In 1877, H. P. Jacobs and Black ministers from the Mississippi Baptist Missionary ...
Speakeasies to Symphonies
James P. Johnson (1894–1955) is one of the most important figures in twentieth-century American music. However, few people other than scholars and serious fans know of his life and work. Rare jazz aficionados k ...
Strange Fruit and Bitter Roots
Since the publication of The Middle Passage: White Ships/Black Cargo by Tom Feelings, more African American creators have used graphic narratives to explore key moments in colonial and US history. These ...
Real and Imagined Worlds
Claude McKay (1890–1948) was a versatile Jamaican American writer and poet and a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance. In addition to two autobiographies and a documentary study of Harlem, McKay wrote p ...
Duke Ellington's Symphonic Visions
Duke Ellington’s Symphonic Visions, the culmination of a decade-long study of Ellington’s compositions for the symphony orchestra by author Luca Bragalini, is the first book entirely dedicated to Ellington’s s ...
The Tougaloo Nine
During a dramatic three-day period in March 1961, nine students from historically Black Tougaloo College staged sit-ins at the all-White Main Library in Jackson, Mississippi. The students conducted their ...