Exam Review Notes

Africa's Opinion & Primary Identity Sources

• When reviewing primary identity sources, prioritize reading the summaries.
• A detailed line-by-line analysis of heritage is provided.
• A summary of key themes is available as well.
• Four major themes are important:
  • Apply these themes (e.g., resistance and resilience) to different scenarios.
  • Even a basic understanding can help in addressing related questions.

Poems

• One particular poem is very popular and likely to appear on the exam.
• Be prepared to compare and contrast different poems.
• Line-by-line analysis, summaries, key themes, and interpretations are provided.

Black History Education & African American Studies

• Expect questions about African American studies, its origins, and foundational activists.
• Review summaries of key figures on Fiveable:
  • Arturo Schomburg
  • Zora Neale Hurston
  • Carter G. Woodson (very important)

Carter G. Woodson

• Founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (now the Association for the Study of African American Life and History).
• Authored The Miseducation of the Negro, summarized on Fiveable.
• Laid the groundwork for inclusive, culturally relevant education.
• Challenged W. E. B. Du Bois's concept of the "Talented Tenth".
• Critiqued the Eurocentric curriculum, deeming it unsuitable for Black students.

Arturo Schomburg

• Established the Schomburg Center in Harlem, housing historical artifacts, books, and maps related to African American history.
• Authored "The Negro Digs Up His Past", arguing that Black people must understand their history to shape their present and future.

Schomburg's Key Arguments

• Blacks must "remake themselves" and their identity by understanding their past.
• Three conclusions:
  • Blacks have been active collaborators in their freedom and advancement.
  • Exceptional Black individuals have been unfairly dissociated from the group.
  • Black racial origins offer a record of credible group achievement and are vital to cultural development.
• Argues the American Negro must remake his past to make his future.

Woodson's Key Arguments

• A white education system cannot properly educate Black people.
• Black people should not imitate but create their own curriculum to reflect their realities and past.
• The mere imparting of information is not education; it must make a man think and do for himself.
• Advocated for African American studies.
• Critiqued the Eurocentric curriculum of white education, stating that it would never work for Black people.

The Miseducation of the Negro - Key Points

• Black schools can perpetuate inferiority by following white models.
• Teaching a Black student that their "black face is a curse" is the "worst sort of lynching".
• This "lynching of the mind" kills aspirations and leads to vagabondage and crime.
• This re-education is more important than the anti-lynching movement.
• If lynching didn't start in schools, it wouldn't be something.
• There would be no reason to exploit, enslave, or exterminate a class that everybody is taught to regard as inferior.
• In schools of journalism, Negroes are being taught how to edit for white newspapers that would never hire them.
• Even educated blacks don't know the psychology and philosophy of the Negro. Educated people hope to make the Negro conform quickly to the standards of the whites.
• If a Negro successfully imitates the whites, nothing new has thereby been accomplished. The unusual gifts of the race have not thereby been developed. The world wonders what the Negro was doing.

Key Figures

• Carter G. Woodson
• W. E. B. Du Bois
• Alan Locke
• Booker T. Washington
• You should know the basics about these figures.

Reclaiming History as Resistance

• Claim: Recovering and teaching Black history is a form of resistance against systemic oppression and erasure.
• Evidence from Schomburg: Highlights uncovering African achievements to combat falsehoods.

Knowledge of Self and Racial Uplift

• Claim: True racial progress depends on Black people gaining accurate knowledge of their cultural and historical contributions.
• Evidence from Woodson: Without this knowledge, Black people are misled into believing they have no place in history, limiting their ability to lead and advocate for themselves.
• Evidence from Schomburg: understanding African civilizations, black inventors, and scholars leads to a sense of pride and empowerment.

White-Controlled Education Systems and Disempowerment

• Claim: White institutions intentionally shape Black education to reinforce white supremacy.
• Evidence from Woodson:The Miseducation of the Negro presents a critique of white institutions.
• Woodson argues that the education of Black people prepared them to serve rather than to lead.
• History as taught in most schools excluded non-European contributions to world civilization.

Black Intellectuals and Identity Reconstruction

• Claim: Black thinkers shaped a more accurate, empowering vision of Black identity.
• Evidence from Schomburg: He built archives (leading to the Schomburg Center) to preserve Black heritage.
• Woodson shows how miseducation causes internalized inferiority and compliance with racial hierarchies.

Harlem Renaissance and the New Negro Movement

• Claim: The works of Schomburg and Woodson reflect the New Negro movement's commitment to intellectual liberation, cultural pride, and self-determination.
• Support: Both thinkers contribute to redefining black identity in opposition to stereotypes and limitations placed by white-dominated culture.

Marcus Garvey

• Represented black nationalism.
• Believed that Black folk should be separated from white people.
• Started the "Back to Africa" movement.
• The FBI was watching him and found misappropriation of funds in a company he started. He was deported and promised not to return to America.

Important reminder

• Make sure to answer the short answer questions and that they can cover the 4 major topics in the CED (Course and Exam Description provided by CollegeBoard).

Symphony in Black & Black Performance

• This unit provides an overview, especially connecting to the Harlem Renaissance and jazz.
• Sources are primarily photos with summaries.
• Duke Ellington and Cab Calloway are important figures.
• Film & Stage contributions during the Renaissance.

Great Migration

• An anonymous letter encouraging African Americans to leave the South.
• A map of the Great Migration.
• A series of paintings by Jacob Lawrence.