Cultural Survey Spring Semester 2025

Chinese Exclusion Act

A federal law signed in 1882 that prohibited the immigration of Chinese laborers to the United States, marking the first significant law restricting immigration based on ethnicity.

Sambo

A derogatory and racist caricature of Black people, depicting them as lazy, submissive, and childlike.

Issei & Nisei

"Issei" refers to the first generation of Japanese immigrants to America, while "Nisei" refers to their American-born children, the second generation.

Jo Ann Robinson

An activist and educator, key figure in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and president of the Women's Political Council.

Jim Crow Laws

State and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States, enacted after the Reconstruction period and lasting until the Civil Rights Movement.

Executive Order 9066

A 1942 order by President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorizing the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

Militia Service

The obligation of citizens to serve in a state or national military force, particularly prominent during colonial and early U.S. history.

Nat Turner

An enslaved African American who led a rebellion of enslaved people in Southampton County, Virginia, in 1831, which led to a harsher crackdown on enslaved people and free blacks.

Vincent Chin

A Chinese American man whose murder in 1982 by two autoworkers in Detroit highlighted issues of racism and anti-Asian sentiment in the U.S.

Yellow Peril

A racist ideology and fear that Asian immigrants, particularly Chinese and Japanese, posed a threat to Western civilization.

Fugitive Slave Act

Laws passed in 1793 and 1850 requiring the return of runaway enslaved people to their enslavers, even if they were found in free states.

Plessy v. Ferguson

An 1896 Supreme Court decision that upheld racial segregation under the "separate but equal" doctrine.

Freedom Summer

A 1964 campaign to register African American voters in Mississippi, organized by civil rights groups including the SNCC and CORE.

Mamie Till Mobley

Mother of Emmett Till, whose brutal murder in 1955 and her decision to have an open casket funeral helped galvanize the Civil Rights Movement.

Coolie

A derogatory term used to describe unskilled laborers from Asia, particularly China and India, during the 19th and early 20th centuries.

NAACP

A civil rights organization founded in 1909 to fight for the rights of African Americans through legal action and advocacy.

Bacon's Rebellion

A 1676 rebellion in the Virginia Colony led by Nathaniel Bacon against Governor William Berkeley's administration, partly fueled by tensions between frontier settlers and Native Americans. Created a fear of an alliance between poor white indentured servants and Black enslaved people

Aurelia Browder

An African American civil rights activist who was the lead plaintiff in Browder v. Gayle, the case that led to the desegregation of buses in Montgomery, Alabama.

Civil Rights Act of 1964

Landmark federal legislation that outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin and ended segregation in public places.

Great Migration

The movement of millions of African Americans from the rural South to urban areas in the North and West between 1916 and 1970, seeking better economic opportunities and escaping Jim Crow laws.

Nannie Helen Burroughs

An educator, orator, religious leader, and civil rights activist who founded the National Training School for Women and Girls in Washington, D.C.

Emancipation Proclamation

An executive order issued by President Abraham Lincoln on January 1, 1863, declaring the freedom of all enslaved people in Confederate-held territory.

Angel Island

The immigration station in San Francisco Bay where many Asian immigrants, particularly Chinese, were detained and interrogated between 1910 and 1940.

David Walker

An African American abolitionist and author of "Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World," a call for black unity and self-help in the fight against oppression.

Sharecropping

A system where landowners allowed tenants to use their land in return for a share of the crops produced, which often led to a cycle of debt and poverty for the tenants, many of whom were African American.

Japanese American Internment

The forced relocation and internment of about 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II, following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Model Minority Myth

The stereotype that Asian Americans are inherently successful, hardworking, and academically gifted, which overlooks the diversity and challenges within Asian American communities.

Abolition

The movement to end slavery, which gained momentum in the 19th century and culminated in the Emancipation Proclamation and the 13th Amendment.

Chinese Immigration for the Transcontinental Railroad

The large-scale immigration of Chinese laborers in the 1860s to work on the construction of the U.S. Transcontinental Railroad, facing harsh conditions and discrimination.

SNCC

A civil rights organization founded in 1960 that played a major role in the sit-ins, Freedom Rides, and voter registration drives of the 1960s.

Manzanar

One of the ten camps where Japanese Americans were interned during World War II, located in California.

Little Rock Nine

A group of African American students who integrated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957, facing violent opposition.

Hart-Celler Act

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, which ended the national origins quota system and allowed for a more diverse immigration flow to the U.S.

Jane Crow

A term used to describe the intersection of racial and gender discrimination faced by African American women, akin to "Jim Crow" laws.

Harriet Tubman

An abolitionist and former enslaved woman who became a conductor on the Underground Railroad, leading many enslaved people to freedom.

Black Panther Party

A political organization founded in 1966 by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale to challenge police brutality and provide community services in African American neighborhoods.

Fannie Lou Hamer

A civil rights activist known for her powerful speeches, co-founding the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, and her work in voting rights and women's rights.

Mass incarceration in the US

The extensive and disproportionate imprisonment of individuals, particularly African Americans, often linked to policies like the War on Drugs and mandatory sentencing laws.

13th Amendment

An amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1865, that abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime.

Freedom Rides

Civil rights protests in 1961 where interracial groups rode buses into the segregated South to challenge non-enforcement of Supreme Court rulings that segregated buses were unconstitutional.

Abolitionism

The movement to end slavery, which included efforts by activists, both black and white, to promote the cause through various means including literature, speeches, and organizing.

Brown v. Board of Education

A 1954 Supreme Court case that declared state laws establishing separate public schools for black and white students to be unconstitutional.

Montgomery Bus Boycott

A civil rights protest in 1955-1956 in Montgomery, Alabama, against racial segregation on public buses, sparked by Rosa Parks' arrest.

Lynching

The illegal killing of someone, typically by a mob, often by hanging, historically used to terrorize African Americans in the U.S. South.

Vietnam Refugee Resettlement Programs

Initiatives by the U.S. government and various organizations to assist Vietnamese refugees after the Vietnam War, including Operation New Life and others.

Gentlemen's Agreement of 1907

An informal agreement between the U.S. and Japan whereby Japan agreed to limit emigration to the U.S., and the U.S. would not impose formal restrictions on Japanese immigration.

Black Codes

Laws passed in the southern states after the Civil War to restrict the rights of newly freed African Americans and maintain racial inequality.

Paper Sons

Chinese immigrants who entered the U.S. by falsely claiming to be the children of Chinese American citizens, often using forged documents.

Melba Pattillo Beals

One of the Little Rock Nine, the group of African American students who integrated Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957.

Indentured Servitude

A labor system where people paid for their passage to the New World with a fixed term of labor, often under harsh conditions, distinct from chattel slavery but still exploitative.