The Black American Reference Book PDF
Preview The Black American Reference Book
n# A|B f t c n ft fra mm Successor to the standard AMERICAN NEGRO REFERENCE BOOK New, much enlarged, fully up-to-date. The most comprehensive single-volume work of its kind ever published, e 4 i tokes Fund $29.95 THE BLACK AMERICAN REFERENCE BOOK is based on the classic work originally published in 1965, THE AMERICAN NEGRO REFERENCE BOOK — a unique single volume source work acclaimed both for its comprehensiveness and scholarship. Now, completely updated and enlarged, with over eighty percent new material, THE BLACK AMERICAN REFERENCE BOOK is truly the most comprehensive single source of information on the black experience in America available today. The book’s contributors compose a galaxy of distinguished scholars and specialists including John Hope Franklin, Carl B. Stokes, Gordon Allport, Langston Hughes, Constance Baker Motley, and others. They treat such topics as legal status, women, sports, education, the arts, religion, politics, protest movements, and youth, with a balance of historical and current material which offers the reader depth and perspective. Practical to use, THE BLACK AMERICAN REFERENCE BOOK is completely indexed for ease in researching particular data. However, several chapter groupings also serve as symposia of broader topics. For example, “The Black American in Agriculture,” “The Black American Worker,” and “The Black Role in the Economy” comprise a handbook on the economic life of black Americans. Similarly, the chapters on “Afro-American Music,” “Afro-American Art,” “The Popular Media,” “Black Influences in the American Theater,” and “The Black Contribution to American Letters,” taken together provide a guide to the black cultural milieu. (C ontinued on back flap) Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2018 with funding from Kahle/Austin Foundation https://archive.org/details/blackamericanrefOOOOunse THE BLACK A MERICAN REFERENCE BOOK THE BLACK AMERICAN reference B( >OK W > V Edited by MABEL M. SMYTHE 3 s '!* 1 SPONSORED BY THE PHELPS-STOKES FUND PRENTICE-HALL, INC. Englewood Cliifs, New Jersey The Black American Reference Book Edited by Mabel M. Smythe Copyright © 1976 by Prentice-Hall, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without permission in writing from the publisher. Printed in the United States of America Prentice-Hall International, Inc., London Prentice-Hall of Australia, Pty. Ltd., Sydney Prentice-Hall of Canada, Ltd., Toronto Prentice-Hall of India Private Ltd., New Delhi Prentice-Hall of Japan, Inc., Tokyo 10 9876543 _ Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Main entry under title: The Black American reference book. Previous ed., by J. P. Davis, published in 1966 under title: The American Negro reference book. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Afro-Americans. I. Smythe, Mabel M. II. Davis, John Preston, 1905-1973, ed. The American Negro reference book. III. Phelps-Stokes Fund. E185.D25 1976 301.45'19'6073 75-26511 ISBN 0-13-077586-X Brief excerpt in Chapter 10 reprinted by permission of Grove Press, Inc.: The Autobiography of M alcolm X copyright © 1965 by Alex Haley and Malcolm X. Copyright © 1965 by Alex Haley and Betty Shabazz. Some material in Chapter 22 reprinted with the permission of the following: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, Inc., from Ceremonies in Dark Old Men by Lonne Elder, copyright © 1965, 1969 by Lonne Elder, III. Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc. and William Morris Agency, from No Place To Be Somebody by Charles Gordone. PREFACE The Black American Reference Book brings together in one volume a comprehensive view of the world of black Americans: history; personality pressures; social and economic status; political activities; involvement in and contribution to arts and letters; participation and treatment in the popular media, sports, and the armed forces; and other matters related to these categories. These themes, developed by a distinguished group of scholars and specialists, offer a balance of historical and current material designed to give the reader depth and perspective. The Reference Book can be used in many ways. Viewed as a unit, “The Black American in Agriculture,” “The Black Worker,” and “The Black Role in the Economy,” comprise a handbook on the economic life of black Americans. The chapters on “The Black Population in the United States,” “The Black Family, “The Black Woman,” “Young Black Americans,” “Educating Black Ameri¬ cans,” and “Prejudice: A Symposium,” offer broad insights into social status. The sections dealing with “Afro-American Music,” “Afro-American Art, The Popular Media,” “Black Influences in the American Theater,” and “The Black Contribution to American Letters,” taken together, provide a wealth of cultural insights and understanding. Such chapters as John Hope Franklin’s “A Brief History,” and Dr. Charles A. Pinderhughes’ “Black Personality in American Society,” are in themselves complete and provocative introductions to the subjects treated. Judge Constance Baker Motley’s “The Legal Status of Black Americans,” with interpretive commentary by Judge Robert L. Carter, stands as a succinct handbook of civil rights cases. Since in an age of precipitous change it is impossible for the statistics presented in a work of this scope to remain current for more than a few months, emphasis has been placed on trends and interpretation rather than on the specifics of the moment. The sponsorship by the Phelps-Stokes Fund of the Reference Book grows out of a commitment of more than sixty years to increasing the understanding of black Americans on the part of others, along with a concern for research in the area of black education, development, and culture in the United States and abroad. In the past, the fund has sponsored more than fifty publications of research studies and reports, ranging in coverage from Thomas Jackson Woofter, Jr. s N egro Migration, Changes in Rural Organization and Population of t he Cotton Belt (1920) to W. E. B. Preface VI DuBois and Guy B. Johnson’s Encyclopedia of t he Negro — Preparatory Volume (1945). The fund is currently preparing The American Indian Reference Book, a companion volume related to its commitment to another American minority. Ultimately the fund expects to develop a Phelps-Stokes Reference Shelf of publications, for which The Black American Reference Book provides the nucleus. Subjects treated will be related to the fund in such areas of interest as: the education of black and Indian Americans, Africans, and poor whites; housing; and the development of understanding of its target groups. The thirty-eight authors who have contributed to the Reference Book are listed with brief pertinent background information regarding their scholarly interests on page xix. The manuscript has been read by a variety of specialists who have offered valuable suggestions; other consultants have also been helpful in p roviding information and assistance at various stages of the work. They are not, however, responsible for the final text. A profound debt is owed to them all; we wish to acknowledge their professional assistance here: Frederick S. Arkhurst, formerly Ghana’s Ambassador to the United Nations and later Vice President for African Programs, the Phelps-Stokes Fund; Joyce Cooper Arkhurst, librarian and writer; Darwin Bolden, President, Pan-African Business Information Center; the late Horace Mann Bond, retired Dean of the School of Education, Atlanta University, and President Emeritus, Lincoln University (Pa.); Robert S. Browne, Director, Black Economic Research Center; James E. Cheek, President, Howard University; Kenneth B. Clark, Chairman, Department of Psychology, the City College, City University of New York; Mamie Phipps Clark, Director, Northside Center for Child Development; Alice T. Curran, Vice President, Encyclopaedia Britannica Educational Corporation; James Curtis, M.D., Associate Dean, Cornell University Medical College; Dan Davis, Special Assistant to the Executive Director, National Urban League; John A. Davis, Chairman, Department of Government, the City College, City University of New York; Lloyd C. Elam, M.D., President, Meharry Medical College; William Gordon, United States Information Agency; the late Percy Ifill, architect; Nell Jackson, Professor of Physical Education, University of Illinois; the staff of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, particularly Ernest Kaiser; John Henrik Clarke, Professor of Black Studies, Hunter College; Carlton Molette, Professor of Drama, Spelman College; Annelle Murray, of the research staff of Encyclopaedia Britannica Educational Corporation; Moran Weston, pastor, St. Phillip s Episcopal Church; Ida Wood, Vice President for Scholarship and Exchange Programs, the Phelps-Stokes Fund. In paying tribute to those who have made this work possible, a special word is due to four of our authors who did not live to see this edition completed. The first of these is the renowned Langston Hughes, whose lively presentation of black involvement with the American theater appeared in The American Negro Reference
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