Fiction
Beloved
Toni Morrison
A mother and daughter reckon with the afterlife of slavery in a house haunted by a child’s return.
Reading list
Black Hamlets of the Bluegrass
Freedom, land, and the work of building communities in and beyond Kentucky.
Begin with The Kentucky African American Encyclopedia to identify local people and places. Read Du Bois for a national view of Reconstruction, then set it beside an account of literacy or schooling after emancipation. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry offers a fictional comparison about landownership in Mississippi. Ask which claims a deed, school roster, or family account could help establish.
Visit the related Lyric pageContinue the story
Recommended reading
Reference
The Kentucky African American Encyclopedia
Gerald L. Smith, Karen Cotton McDaniel, John A. Hardin
A reference work brings together people, institutions, and events in Black Kentucky history.
Essays
The Souls of Black Folk
W. E. B. Du Bois
Du Bois explores emancipation’s aftermath, segregated education, and the experience he calls double consciousness.
History
Self-Taught
Heather Andrea Williams
The book follows Black people’s pursuit of reading and schooling before, during, and after the Civil War.
Oral history
Barracoon
Zora Neale Hurston
Hurston records Cudjo Lewis’s account of captivity, the Atlantic crossing, and life in Africatown.
History
Black Reconstruction in America
W. E. B. Du Bois
Du Bois centers Black workers and political participation in an account of Reconstruction and its overthrow.
Memoir
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Frederick Douglass
Douglass describes enslavement, his pursuit of literacy, and his emergence as an abolitionist.
Memoir
My Bondage and My Freedom
Frederick Douglass
Douglass revisits the details of his enslavement and expands on his life in the abolitionist movement.
Memoir
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
Harriet Jacobs
Jacobs recounts exploitation, years spent in hiding, and her efforts to secure freedom for her children.
History
Schooling the Freed People
Ronald E. Butchart
A history of the teachers and institutions that helped build schools in the first decades after emancipation.
History
From Slavery to Freedom
John Hope Franklin
A broad historical survey provides context for the institutions and struggles behind local stories.
History
How the Word Is Passed
Clint Smith
Visits to historic sites and memorials ask how public institutions tell the story of American slavery.
Fiction
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
Mildred D. Taylor
Cassie Logan watches her Mississippi family defend the land and independence they have worked to hold.
Memoir
Narrative of William W. Brown, a Fugitive Slave
William Wells Brown
Brown describes enslavement and escape, illuminating a life that began near Lexington and led into abolitionism.
Fiction
Conjure Women
Afia Atakora
A mother and daughter practice healing in a community struggling through the transition from slavery to freedom.