AP African American Studies Resource Archive | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

A mosaic featuring a black and white portrait of Audre Lorde surrounded by bursts of gold, white, and black tiles.

“Audre Lorde” in “Beacons”

by Rico Gaston

View a mosaic portrait of Lorde installed in the New York City subway system.

Work of Art

A tile mosaic in a subway station of drum majors in white uniforms dancing in formation.

“PARADE”

by Derek Fordjour

View an homage to historic parades through Harlem in this mosaic created in the New York City subway system.

Work of Art

A Black man wearing a black baseball cap, orange shirt, jeans, and sneakers, walking along a bridge with a series of metal panels in the background.

“Empirical Evidence”

by Damien Davis

View a work of art paying homage to the African American community of Mount Vernon, NY.

Work of Art

A white tile mosaic mural of several Black people airborne above buildings.

“Flying Home: Harlem Heroes and Heroines”

by Faith Ringgold

View a fantastical homage to Harlem history through this work of art in the New York City subway.

Work of Art

A photograph with impressionist, multicolored mosaic mural of people on a subway train in the background, with beams holding up a subway station in the foreground of the photograph.

“New York in Transit”

by Jacob Lawrence

View Jacob Lawrence’s last public work, a mosaic mural in New York City's Times Square subway station.

Work of Art

A large tile mosaic mural of people in a boat.

“Great Waves of Immigration”

by Carmen Lizardo

Explore the history of Afro-Caribbean migration to the US through this mosaic, installed in the New York City subway system.

Work of Art

An infographic on Black mortality rates of those who remained in the South during the Great Migration and those who moved.

Grave Effects of the Great Migration

by Jonathan Lee, Duke University

Explore some of the health outcomes of the Great Migration.

Secondary Source

Four maps of the United States, each with bar charts noting foreign-born population from different regions of Africa.

Foreign-born Population from Africa by State, 2000

by Michael Siegel and Rutgers Cartography

Explore the further diversification of African American demographics through these maps.

Thematic Map

Map of the Caribbean with bar charts for select countries noting emigration patterns from 1989 through 2001.

Immigrants from the Caribbean Admitted to the US, 1989–2001

by Michael Siegel and Rutgers Cartography

Visualize the shift in the Caribbean American demographics at the end of the twentieth century.

Thematic Map

A Black man wearing a tan sweater and white pants in a power wheelchair, talking to a white man in a white hat, white shirt, jean shorts, white socks, and black boots, as another white man in a yellow shirt, khaki shorts, white socks, and sneakers looks on.

Both Black and Disabled: Intersectional Experiences

by Jenifer L. Barclay

Explore the history of stigmatization of, and resiliency among, Black disabled people in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Essay

Handwritten document in French headlined "Edit du Roi" [Edict from the King].

Louisiana Code Noir

1685

Read this excerpt from France’s original colonial slave code.

Primary Source

The Freedmen’s Bureau and African American Families

by Justene Hill Edwards

Understand the roles the Freedmen’s Bureau played in supporting African American families and communities.

Essay