WMU Research Guides: African American and African Studies: Digital Collections

Specialized Digital Collections

Music Online: African American Music Reference This link opens in a new window
African American Newspapers, Series 1 (1827-1998) This link opens in a new window
African Newspapers, Series 1 (1800-1922) This link opens in a new window
America's Historical Newspapers This link opens in a new window
American Memory This link opens in a new window
Music Online: American Music This link opens in a new window
Black Drama: Third Edition (Alexander Street) This link opens in a new window
Black Thought and Culture (Alexander Street) This link opens in a new window
Liberator, The This link opens in a new window
National Anti-Slavery Standard This link opens in a new window
Black Studies Center (formerly Schomburg Studies on the Black Experience) (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window

What About Documentaries?

Unchained Memories : Readings from the Slave Narratives
Call Number: DVD E 1
When the Civil War ended in 1865, more than 4 million slaves were set free. By the late 1930s, 100,000 former slaves were still alive. In the midst of the Great Depression, journalists and writers traveled the country to record the memories of the last generation of African Americans born into bondage. They conducted over 2,000 interviews and this DVD chronicles some of them.

The WMU Libraries subscribes to numerous streaming video databases. Check out the Streaming Video Sources Guide.

African American History in American Memory

The American Memory collection of the Library of Congress is especially rich in primary documents about the African American experience. They have 17 different collections, including sheet music, slave narratives, broadsides, Frederick Douglass papers, personal narratives from the South, baseball and Jackie Robinson.

One of the most useful is this collection of African American pamphlets from 1824 to 1909.