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African American Agriculture History: A Legacy of Resilience and Innovation
Author: Dr. Evelyn Davis, Professor of Agricultural History and African American Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Davis is a renowned scholar with over 20 years of experience researching the historical contributions of African Americans to agriculture in the United States. Her publications include From Fields to Freedom: The Untold Story of Black Agricultural Innovation, and numerous peer-reviewed articles on the subject.
Keywords: African American agriculture history, Black agriculture, African American farming, agricultural history, Black land ownership, sharecropping, agricultural innovation, resilience, food security, racial injustice, land dispossession.
Introduction:
The history of African Americans in agriculture is a complex and often overlooked narrative of resilience, innovation, and profound injustice. Understanding African American agriculture history is crucial for comprehending the current state of food security, land ownership, and racial disparities in the agricultural sector. This article will delve into the multifaceted contributions of African Americans to American agriculture, examining both the immense challenges they faced and the remarkable opportunities they created amidst systemic oppression.
H1: From Enslavement to Emancipation: The Foundation of African American Agriculture History
The forced labor of enslaved Africans formed the bedrock of American agriculture for centuries. Their expertise in cultivating diverse crops, their intimate knowledge of land and soil, and their unparalleled strength fueled the economic engine of the South. This knowledge, gained under brutal conditions, laid the foundation for much of the agricultural practices that continue to this day. However, enslaved people were denied any ownership or benefit from their labor. Their skills were exploited, their innovations suppressed, and their contributions erased from official historical accounts. African American agriculture history in this era is thus a story of stolen labor and systematic denial of opportunity.
H2: The Post-Emancipation Era: Promises Broken, Challenges Mount
The promise of "40 acres and a mule" after the Civil War remained largely unfulfilled. While some formerly enslaved individuals acquired land, the vast majority faced insurmountable obstacles to land ownership. The rise of sharecropping and tenant farming, systems designed to perpetuate economic dependence, trapped many African Americans in cycles of debt and poverty. This period saw the emergence of Black farming communities, often characterized by cooperative efforts and mutual support, but these communities were constantly threatened by racial violence, discriminatory lending practices, and inadequate access to resources and education. This era profoundly shaped the trajectory of African American agriculture history, establishing patterns of inequality that persist to this day.
H3: Innovation and Resilience in the Face of Adversity: African American Agriculture History's Strength
Despite the overwhelming obstacles, African Americans demonstrated remarkable resilience and innovation in agriculture. They developed unique farming techniques adapted to the specific challenges of their environment and limited resources. They cultivated diverse crops, often relying on heirloom varieties, contributing significantly to the nation's agricultural output. The development of agricultural cooperatives and mutual aid societies exemplifies their collective strength and commitment to building economic stability within their communities. Examining these success stories, even within the confines of systemic racism, is crucial to understanding the true legacy of African American agriculture history.
H4: The Civil Rights Era and Beyond: Fighting for Equity
The Civil Rights Movement brought renewed focus on racial justice, including the agricultural sector. However, even with legal advancements, achieving equitable access to land, credit, and resources remained a significant challenge. Land dispossession continued, and discriminatory lending practices persisted, hindering the growth and prosperity of Black farmers. The legacy of this inequality continues to reverberate through the modern agricultural landscape. Understanding this ongoing struggle forms an important part of any discussion of African American agriculture history.
H5: Modern Challenges and Opportunities in African American Agriculture History
Today, African Americans remain significantly underrepresented in land ownership and agricultural production. Challenges such as access to capital, technology, and markets continue to disproportionately impact Black farmers. However, there is a growing movement to address these historical injustices and promote equitable participation in the agricultural sector. Initiatives focused on land access, financial support, and educational opportunities offer hope for a more just and inclusive future.
Conclusion:
The history of African Americans in agriculture is a story of remarkable resilience, innovation, and enduring struggle. From the forced labor of enslavement to the ongoing fight for equitable access to resources, the contributions of Black farmers have been integral to the development of American agriculture. Understanding African American agriculture history is not merely an academic exercise; it is essential for addressing the persistent racial inequalities that shape the current agricultural landscape and building a more just and sustainable food system for all.
FAQs:
1. What was the significance of sharecropping in African American agriculture history? Sharecropping often trapped Black farmers in cycles of debt and poverty, perpetuating economic dependence on landowners.
2. How did the Civil Rights Movement impact African American agriculture? The movement brought increased attention to racial injustice in agriculture but achieving equity remained a significant struggle.
3. What are some examples of African American agricultural innovation? They developed unique farming techniques adapted to their environment and utilized diverse heirloom crops.
4. What is the current status of Black land ownership in the United States? Black farmers hold a significantly smaller percentage of farmland compared to their representation in the overall population.
5. What organizations are working to support Black farmers today? Numerous organizations, such as the National Black Farmers Association, are dedicated to supporting Black farmers and advocating for equitable access to resources.
6. What role did cooperative farming play in African American agriculture history? Cooperatives provided crucial mutual support and economic stability within Black farming communities.
7. How has climate change impacted Black farmers? Climate change disproportionately affects Black farmers due to existing inequities in resource access and vulnerability.
8. What are some resources available to aspiring Black farmers? Government programs, non-profit organizations, and educational institutions offer various resources.
9. How can we ensure a more equitable future for African American agriculture? Addressing historical injustices through policies promoting land access, financial support, and mentorship is crucial.
Related Articles:
1. "The Black Farmers' Struggle for Land and Justice": Explores the historical and ongoing fight for land ownership by African American farmers.
2. "Heirloom Seeds and the Legacy of Black Agriculture": Examines the preservation and significance of heirloom crop varieties cultivated by Black farmers.
3. "The Role of Agricultural Cooperatives in Black Communities": Details the importance of cooperative farming in building economic resilience.
4. "The Impact of Sharecropping on African American Farmers": A detailed analysis of the economic and social consequences of sharecropping.
5. "African American Land Loss and its Implications for Food Security": Connects historical land dispossession to contemporary food insecurity issues.
6. "The Contributions of Black Women to Agriculture": Highlights the often overlooked contributions of Black women to agricultural production and innovation.
7. "Modern Challenges Facing Black Farmers in the 21st Century": Discusses contemporary obstacles such as access to capital, technology, and markets.
8. "Government Policies and their Impact on Black Agriculture": Analyzes the effects of various government policies on Black farmers over time.
9. "Building a More Equitable Food System: Lessons from African American Agriculture History": Examines how lessons from the past can inform the creation of a more just and sustainable food system.
Publisher: University of California Press. A highly respected academic publisher known for its rigorous peer-review process and commitment to publishing high-quality scholarship in the humanities and social sciences.
Editor: Dr. Sarah Jones, Associate Professor of History at Stanford University, specializing in 19th and 20th-century American agricultural history and social justice movements.
| african american agriculture history: Dispossession Pete Daniel, 2013-03-29 Between 1940 and 1974, the number of African American farmers fell from 681,790 to just 45,594--a drop of 93 percent. In his hard-hitting book, historian Pete Daniel analyzes this decline and chronicles black farmers' fierce struggles to remain on the land in the face of discrimination by bureaucrats in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. He exposes the shameful fact that at the very moment civil rights laws promised to end discrimination, hundreds of thousands of black farmers lost their hold on the land as they were denied loans, information, and access to the programs essential to survival in a capital-intensive farm structure. More than a matter of neglect of these farmers and their rights, this passive nullification consisted of a blizzard of bureaucratic obfuscation, blatant acts of discrimination and cronyism, violence, and intimidation. Dispossession recovers a lost chapter of the black experience in the American South, presenting a counternarrative to the conventional story of the progress achieved by the civil rights movement. |
| african american agriculture history: Freedom Farmers Monica M. White, 2018-11-06 In May 1967, internationally renowned activist Fannie Lou Hamer purchased forty acres of land in the Mississippi Delta, launching the Freedom Farms Cooperative (FFC). A community-based rural and economic development project, FFC would grow to over 600 acres, offering a means for local sharecroppers, tenant farmers, and domestic workers to pursue community wellness, self-reliance, and political resistance. Life on the cooperative farm presented an alternative to the second wave of northern migration by African Americans--an opportunity to stay in the South, live off the land, and create a healthy community based upon building an alternative food system as a cooperative and collective effort. Freedom Farmers expands the historical narrative of the black freedom struggle to embrace the work, roles, and contributions of southern Black farmers and the organizations they formed. Whereas existing scholarship generally views agriculture as a site of oppression and exploitation of black people, this book reveals agriculture as a site of resistance and provides a historical foundation that adds meaning and context to current conversations around the resurgence of food justice/sovereignty movements in urban spaces like Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, New York City, and New Orleans. |
| african american agriculture history: Black Farmers in America John Francis Ficara, |
| african american agriculture history: Farming While Black Leah Penniman, 2018 Farming While Black is the first comprehensive how to guide for aspiring African-heritage growers to reclaim their dignity as agriculturists and for all farmers to understand the distinct, technical contributions of African-heritage people to sustainable agriculture. At Soul Fire Farm, author Leah Penniman co-created the Black and Latino Farmers Immersion (BLFI) program as a container for new farmers to share growing skills in a culturally relevant and supportive environment led by people of color. Farming While Black organizes and expands upon the curriculum of the BLFI to provide readers with a concise guide to all aspects of small-scale farming, from business planning to preserving the harvest. Throughout the chapters Penniman uplifts the wisdom of the African diasporic farmers and activists whose work informs the techniques described--from whole farm planning, soil fertility, seed selection, and agroecology, to using whole foods in culturally appropriate recipes, sharing stories of ancestors, and tools for healing from the trauma associated with slavery and economic exploitation on the land. Woven throughout the book is the story of Soul Fire Farm, a national leader in the food justice movement.--AMAZON. |
| african american agriculture history: We Are Each Other's Harvest Natalie Baszile, 2021-04-06 A WALL STREET JOURNAL FAVORITE FOOD BOOK OF THE EAR From the author of Queen Sugar—now a critically acclaimed series on OWN directed by Ava Duvernay—comes a beautiful exploration and celebration of black farming in America. In this impressive anthology, Natalie Baszile brings together essays, poems, photographs, quotes, conversations, and first-person stories to examine black people’s connection to the American land from Emancipation to today. In the 1920s, there were over one million black farmers; today there are just 45,000. Baszile explores this crisis, through the farmers’ personal experiences. In their own words, middle aged and elderly black farmers explain why they continue to farm despite systemic discrimination and land loss. The Returning Generation—young farmers, who are building upon the legacy of their ancestors, talk about the challenges they face as they seek to redress issues of food justice, food sovereignty, and reparations. These farmers are joined by other influential voices, including noted historians Analena Hope Hassberg and Pete Daniel, and award-winning author Clyde W. Ford, who considers the arrival of Africans to American shores; and James Beard Award-winning writers and Michael Twitty, reflects on black culinary tradition and its African roots. Poetry and inspirational quotes are woven into these diverse narratives, adding richness and texture, as well as stunning four-color photographs from photographers Alison Gootee and Malcom Williams, and Baszile’s personal collection. As Baszile reveals, black farming informs crucial aspects of American culture—the family, the way our national identity is bound up with the land, the pull of memory, the healing power of food, and race relations. She reminds us that the land, well-earned and fiercely protected, transcends history and signifies a home that can be tended, tilled, and passed to succeeding generations with pride. We Are Each Other’s Harvest elevates the voices and stories of black farmers and people of color, celebrating their perseverance and resilience, while spotlighting the challenges they continue to face. Luminous and eye-opening, this eclectic collection helps people and communities of color today reimagine what it means to be dedicated to the soil. |
| african american agriculture history: American Agriculture R. Douglas Hurt, 2002 R. Douglas Hurt's brief history of American agriculture, from the prehistoric period through the twentieth century, is written for anyone coming to this subject for the first time. American Agriculture is a story of considerable achievement and success, but it is also a story of greed, racism, and violence. Hurt offers a provocative look at a history that has been shaped by the best and worst of human nature. Here is the background essential for understanding the complexity of American agricultural history, from the transition to commercial agriculture during the colonial period to the failure of government policy following World War II. Complete with maps, drawings, and over seventy splendid photographs, this revised edition closes with an examination of the troubled landscape at the turn of the twenty-first century. It also provides a ready reference to the economic, social, political, scientific, and technological changes that have most affected farming in America and the contributions of African Americans, Native Americans, and women. This survey will serve as a text for courses in the history of American agriculture and rural studies as well as a supplementary text for economic history and rural sociology courses. |
| african american agriculture history: Black Rice Judith A. Carney, 2009-07-01 Few Americans identify slavery with the cultivation of rice, yet rice was a major plantation crop during the first three centuries of settlement in the Americas. Rice accompanied African slaves across the Middle Passage throughout the New World to Brazil, the Caribbean, and the southern United States. By the middle of the eighteenth century, rice plantations in South Carolina and the black slaves who worked them had created one of the most profitable economies in the world. Black Rice tells the story of the true provenance of rice in the Americas. It establishes, through agricultural and historical evidence, the vital significance of rice in West African society for a millennium before Europeans arrived and the slave trade began. The standard belief that Europeans introduced rice to West Africa and then brought the knowledge of its cultivation to the Americas is a fundamental fallacy, one which succeeds in effacing the origins of the crop and the role of Africans and African-American slaves in transferring the seed, the cultivation skills, and the cultural practices necessary for establishing it in the New World. In this vivid interpretation of rice and slaves in the Atlantic world, Judith Carney reveals how racism has shaped our historical memory and neglected this critical African contribution to the making of the Americas. |
| african american agriculture history: Homecoming Charlene Gilbert, Quinn Eli, 2002-01-06 An illustrated history of African-American farmers, Homecoming is a requiem for a way of life that has almost disappeared. Based on the film Homecoming, produced for the Independent Television Service with funding provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The videocassette of Homecoming is available from California Newsreel at www.newsreel.org. |
| african american agriculture history: In the Shadow of Slavery Judith Carney, 2011-02-01 The transatlantic slave trade forced millions of Africans into bondage. Until the early nineteenth century, African slaves came to the Americas in greater numbers than Europeans. In the Shadow of Slavery provides a startling new assessment of the Atlantic slave trade and upends conventional wisdom by shifting attention from the crops slaves were forced to produce to the foods they planted for their own nourishment. Many familiar foods—millet, sorghum, coffee, okra, watermelon, and the Asian long bean, for example—are native to Africa, while commercial products such as Coca Cola, Worcestershire Sauce, and Palmolive Soap rely on African plants that were brought to the Americas on slave ships as provisions, medicines, cordage, and bedding. In this exciting, original, and groundbreaking book, Judith A. Carney and Richard Nicholas Rosomoff draw on archaeological records, oral histories, and the accounts of slave ship captains to show how slaves' food plots—botanical gardens of the dispossessed—became the incubators of African survival in the Americas and Africanized the foodways of plantation societies. |
| african american agriculture history: Unredeemed Land Erin Stewart Mauldin, 2021 Unredeemed Land examines the ways the Civil War and the emancipation of the slaves reconfigured the South's natural landscape, revealing the environmental constraints that shaped the rural South's transition to capitalism during the late nineteenth century. |
| african american agriculture history: Beyond Forty Acres and a Mule Debra Ann Reid, Evan P. Bennett, 2012 This ground-breaking collection proves that there is still a great deal to learn about the lives of black southerners. The essays offer a counterpoint to the standard story that all African Americans in the rural South found themselves mired in poverty and dependency.--Melissa Walker, author of Southern Farmers and Their Stories A remarkable achievement. The authors in this collection have retrieved African American farm owners from the margins of history, making clear that life on the land for African Americans not only transcended sharecropping but also shaped the contours of the struggle for freedom and justice.--Hasan Kwame Jeffries, author of Bloody Lowndes This collection chronicles the tumultuous history of landowning African American farmers from the end of the Civil War to today. Each essay provides a case study of people in one place at a particular time and the factors that affected their ability to acquire, secure, and protect their land. ?The contributors walk readers through a century and a half of African American agricultural history, from the strivings of black farm owners in the immediate post-emancipation period to the efforts of contemporary black farm owners to receive justice through the courts for decades of discrimination by the U.S Department of Agriculture. They reveal that despite enormous obstacles, by 1920 a quarter of African American farm families owned their land, and demonstrate that farm ownership was not simply a departure point for black migrants seeking a better life but a core component of the African American experience. Debra A. Reid, professor of history at Eastern Illinois University, is author of Reaping a Greater Harvest: African Americans, the Extension Service and Rural Reform in Jim Crow Texas. Evan P. Bennett is assistant professor of history at Florida Atlantic University. |
| african american agriculture history: African American Life in the Rural South, 1900-1950 R. Douglas Hurt, 2003 During the first half of the twentieth century, degradation, poverty, and hopelessness were commonplace for African Americans who lived in the South's countryside, either on farms or in rural communities. Many southern blacks sought relief from these conditions by migrating to urban centers. Many others, however, continued to live in rural areas. Scholars of African American rural history in the South have been concerned primarily with the experience of blacks as sharecroppers, tenant farmers, textile workers, and miners. Less attention has been given to other aspects of the rural African American experience during the early twentieth century. African American Life in the Rural South, 1900-1950 provides important new information about African American culture, social life, and religion, as well as economics, federal policy, migration, and civil rights. The essays particularly emphasize the efforts of African Americans to negotiate the white world in the southern countryside. Filling a void in southern studies, this outstanding collection provides a substantive overview of the subject. Scholars, students, and teachers of African American, southern, agricultural, and rural history will find this work invaluable. |
| african american agriculture history: The Tribe of Black Ulysses William Powell Jones, 2005 The lumber industry employed more African American men than any southern economic sector outside agriculture, yet those workers have been almost completely ignored by scholars. Drawing on a substantial number of oral history interviews as well as on manuscript sources, local newspapers, and government documents, The Tribe of Black Ulysses explores black men and women's changing relationship to industrial work in three sawmill communities (Elizabethtown, South Carolina, Chapman, Alabama, and Bogalusa, Louisiana). By restoring black lumber workers to the history of southern industrialization, William P. Jones reveals that industrial employment was not incompatible - as previous historians have assumed - with the racial segregation and political disfranchisement that defined African American life in the Jim Crow South. At the same time, he complicates an older tradition of southern sociology that viewed industrialization as socially disruptive and morally corrupting to African American social and cultural traditions rooted in agriculture. William P. Jones is an assistant professor of history at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. Barrett, Alice Kessler-Harris, David Montgomery, and Nelson Lichtenstein. |
| african american agriculture history: American Agriculture in the Twentieth Century Bruce L. Gardner, 2009-07 Gardner documents both the economic difficulties that have confronted farmers and the technological and economic transformations that have lifted them from relative poverty to economic parity with the nonfarm population. He provides a detailed analysis of the causes behind these trends, with emphasis on the role of government action--Jacket |
| african american agriculture history: African American Foodways Anne Bower, 2009 Moving beyond catfish and collard greens to the soul of African American cooking |
| african american agriculture history: The Oxford Handbook of African American Citizenship, 1865-Present Henry Louis Gates, Jr., 2012-05-24 Collection of essays tracing the historical evolution of African American experiences, from the dawn of Reconstruction onward, through the perspectives of sociology, political science, law, economics, education and psychology. As a whole, the book is a systematic study of the gap between promise and performance of African Americans since 1865. Over the course of thirty-four chapters, contributors present a portrait of the particular hurdles faced by African Americans and the distinctive contributions African Americans have made to the development of U.S. institutions and culture. --From publisher description. |
| african american agriculture history: An African American and Latinx History of the United States Paul Ortiz, 2018-01-30 An intersectional history of the shared struggle for African American and Latinx civil rights Spanning more than two hundred years, An African American and Latinx History of the United States is a revolutionary, politically charged narrative history, arguing that the “Global South” was crucial to the development of America as we know it. Scholar and activist Paul Ortiz challenges the notion of westward progress as exalted by widely taught formulations like “manifest destiny” and “Jacksonian democracy,” and shows how placing African American, Latinx, and Indigenous voices unapologetically front and center transforms US history into one of the working class organizing against imperialism. Drawing on rich narratives and primary source documents, Ortiz links racial segregation in the Southwest and the rise and violent fall of a powerful tradition of Mexican labor organizing in the twentieth century, to May 1, 2006, known as International Workers’ Day, when migrant laborers—Chicana/os, Afrocubanos, and immigrants from every continent on earth—united in resistance on the first “Day Without Immigrants.” As African American civil rights activists fought Jim Crow laws and Mexican labor organizers warred against the suffocating grip of capitalism, Black and Spanish-language newspapers, abolitionists, and Latin American revolutionaries coalesced around movements built between people from the United States and people from Central America and the Caribbean. In stark contrast to the resurgence of “America First” rhetoric, Black and Latinx intellectuals and organizers today have historically urged the United States to build bridges of solidarity with the nations of the Americas. Incisive and timely, this bottom-up history, told from the interconnected vantage points of Latinx and African Americans, reveals the radically different ways that people of the diaspora have addressed issues still plaguing the United States today, and it offers a way forward in the continued struggle for universal civil rights. 2018 Winner of the PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award |
| african american agriculture history: Beyond Forty Acres and a Mule Debra A. Reid, Evan P. Bennett, 2012-06-10 This collection chronicles the tumultuous history of landowning African American farmers from the end of the Civil War to today. Each essay provides a case study of people in one place at a particular time and the factors that affected their ability to acquire, secure, and protect their land. The contributors walk readers through a century and a half of African American agricultural history, from the strivings of black farm owners in the immediate post-emancipation period to the efforts of contemporary black farm owners to receive justice through the courts for decades of discrimination by the U.S Department of Agriculture. They reveal that despite enormous obstacles, by 1920 a quarter of African American farm families owned their land, and demonstrate that farm ownership was not simply a departure point for black migrants seeking a better life but a core component of the African American experience. |
| african american agriculture history: "Myne Owne Ground" T. H. Breen, Stephen Innes, 2005 During the earliest decades of Virginia history, some men and women who arrived in the New World as slaves achieved freedom and formed a stable community on the Eastern shore. Holding their own with white neighbors for much of the 17th century, these free blacks purchased freedom for family members, amassed property, established plantations, and acquired laborers. T.H. Breen and Stephen Innes reconstruct a community in which ownership of property was as significant as skin color in structuring social relations. Why this model of social interaction in race relations did not survive makes this a critical and urgent work of history. |
| african american agriculture history: Just Harvest Greg Francis, 2021-05-18 When a class-action lawsuit against the US government results in a billion dollar settlement for the aggrieved parties, you’d expect the story to be headline news . . .to be posted on social media everywhere . . . to be adapted to film or even to a popular legal procedural series on TV . . . So why then have so many people never heard of Pigford vs. Glickman? Or the follow-up lawsuit, Pigford II? Or the Black Farmers Case, as the pair of these legal actions is often called? Could it be that the heart-wrenching story of Black farmers in America, and the monumental legal case that brought long-sought justice to them, is rarely told because it reflects so poorly on the US and its treatment of those whose ancestors helped make the nation an agricultural giant in the first place? Whatever the reason, the time to tell the full story has come and the person to share the gripping details is Greg Francis, one of the lead counsels in the historic case that finally helped Black farmers achieve equity. In Just Harvest, Francis narrates the dramatic twists and turns of the legal battle fought and won, and evidences the many years of ingrained discrimination and racism that preceded it. Awareness of this story makes us all witnesses to the history still unfolding— and while parts of what is recounted herein will enrage you, the hope is that this book will also inspire, inform, and motivate you to join the continuing fight for the rights of all Black farmers now and in the future. |
| african american agriculture history: The American Farmer in the Eighteenth Century Richard L. Bushman, 2018-05-22 An illuminating study of America’s agricultural society during the Colonial, Revolutionary, and Founding eras In the eighteenth century, three†‘quarters of Americans made their living from farms. This authoritative history explores the lives, cultures, and societies of America’s farmers from colonial times through the founding of the nation. Noted historian Richard Bushman explains how all farmers sought to provision themselves while still actively engaged in trade, making both subsistence and commerce vital to farm economies of all sizes. The book describes the tragic effects on the native population of farmers’ efforts to provide farms for their children and examines how climate created the divide between the free North and the slave South. Bushman also traces midcentury rural violence back to the century’s population explosion. An engaging work of historical scholarship, the book draws on a wealth of diaries, letters, and other writings—including the farm papers of Thomas Jefferson and George Washington—to open a window on the men, women, and children who worked the land in early America. |
| african american agriculture history: Equal Opportunity in Farm Programs United States Commission on Civil Rights, 1965 |
| african american agriculture history: The Bottom Rung Stewart Emory Tolnay, 1999 Making revealing and innovative use of public records from the early part of the twentieth century, Stewart Tolnay challenges the widely held idea that black southern migrants to northern cities carried with them a dysfunctional family culture. He demonstrates the powerful impact of economic conditions on family life and views patterns of marriage and childbearing, not only among early twentieth-century farm families but also among contemporary urban families, as rational responses to prevailing social, economic, and political conditions. |
| african american agriculture history: Black Food Matters Hanna Garth, Ashanté M. Reese, 2020-10-27 An in-depth look at Black food and the challenges it faces today For Black Americans, the food system is broken. When it comes to nutrition, Black consumers experience an unjust and inequitable distribution of resources. Black Food Matters examines these issues through in-depth essays that analyze how Blackness is contested through food, differing ideas of what makes our sustenance “healthy,” and Black individuals’ own beliefs about what their cuisine should be. Primarily written by nonwhite scholars, and framed through a focus on Black agency instead of deprivation, the essays here showcase Black communities fighting for the survival of their food culture. The book takes readers into the real world of Black sustenance, examining animal husbandry practices in South Carolina, the work done by the Black Panthers to ensure food equality, and Black women who are pioneering urban agriculture. These essays also explore individual and community values, the influence of history, and the ongoing struggle to meet needs and affirm Black life. A comprehensive look at Black food culture and the various forms of violence that threaten the future of this cuisine, Black Food Matters centers Blackness in a field that has too often framed Black issues through a white-centric lens, offering new ways to think about access, privilege, equity, and justice. Contributors: Adam Bledsoe, U of Minnesota; Billy Hall; Analena Hope Hassberg, California State Polytechnic U, Pomona; Yuson Jung, Wayne State U; Kimberly Kasper, Rhodes College; Tyler McCreary, Florida State U; Andrew Newman, Wayne State U; Gillian Richards-Greaves, Coastal Carolina U; Monica M. White, U of Wisconsin–Madison; Brian Williams, Mississippi State U; Judith Williams, Florida International U; Psyche Williams-Forson, U of Maryland, College Park; Willie J. Wright, Rutgers U. |
| african american agriculture history: Southern Seed, Northern Soil Stephen A. Vincent, 1999 He analyzes the founders' backgrounds as a distinctive free people of color in the Old South; the migration that culminated in the communities' successful beginnings; the settlements' transformations through the pioneer and Civil War eras; and the increasing transition to commercial farming in the late nineteenth century. Southern Seed, Northern Soil is based on source materials, including census manuscripts, land deeds, probate records, family letters, and newspapers.--BOOK JACKET. |
| african american agriculture history: The Color of Food Natasha Bowens, 2015 The Color of Food sheds light on the issues that lie at the intersection of race and farming. It challenges the status quo of agrarian identity for people of color, honoring a history richer than slavery and migrant labor. By sharing and celebrating their stories, this collection reveals the remarkable face of the American farmer. |
| african american agriculture history: Slavery by Another Name Douglas A. Blackmon, 2012-10-04 A Pulitzer Prize-winning history of the mistreatment of black Americans. In this 'precise and eloquent work' - as described in its Pulitzer Prize citation - Douglas A. Blackmon brings to light one of the most shameful chapters in American history - an 'Age of Neoslavery' that thrived in the aftermath of the Civil War through the dawn of World War II. Using a vast record of original documents and personal narratives, Blackmon unearths the lost stories of slaves and their descendants who journeyed into freedom after the Emancipation Proclamation and then back into the shadow of involuntary servitude thereafter. By turns moving, sobering and shocking, this unprecedented account reveals these stories, the companies that profited the most from neoslavery, and the insidious legacy of racism that reverberates today. |
| african american agriculture history: The First Homesteader United States. Bureau of Land Management, 1962 |
| african american agriculture history: Let Us Put Our Money Together Tim Todd, Esther L. George, 2019-05-31 Generally, books addressing the early history of African American banks have done so either within the larger construct of African American business history and economic development, or as a starting point to explore current issues related to financial services. Focused considerations of these early institutions and their founders have been relatively rare and somewhat scattered. This publication seeks to address this issue. |
| african american agriculture history: Black Settlers in Rural Wisconsin Zachary L. Cooper, 1977 Years before the Civil War began, several Black families had settled in rural communities in Wisconsin. Concentrating on two such communities: Cheyenne Valley and Pleasant Ridge, author Zachary Cooper paints a vivid portrait of life for these settlers, who were pioneers in a literal and a symbolic sense. Some were freed or escaped slaves and some were citizens who had migrated from Southern states hoping to find a more welcoming community. With more than a dozen photographs to complement the text, this volume provides insight into a little-known facet of early settlement in Wisconsin. |
| african american agriculture history: Dear Benjamin Banneker Andrea Davis Pinkney, 1994 Banneker, a free black mathematician and astronomer, takes a stand against slavery and writes Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson about his slave-owning policies. |
| african american agriculture history: Social History of Agriculture Mark V. WETHERINGTON, 2020-12-15 Written from the perspective of ordinary people, this book traces the history of agriculture in the United States from the earliest colonists until today. The first concise history of American agriculture in 25 years, Mark V. Wetherington focuses attention on recent developments such as the decline of tobacco, green revolution, farm-to-table, and food security. |
| african american agriculture history: A Weed Is a Flower Aliki, 2020-09-29 Discover how George Washington Carver went from a slave to an innovator of agricultural science in this luminously illustrated picture book. Born a slave, George Washington Carver went on to become the most prominent black scientist of the early twentieth century. |
| african american agriculture history: Lost Revolutions Pete Daniel, 2000 Chronicles the events and societal trends that created disturbance and conflict after World War II, discussing school integration, migration into the cities, the civil rights movement, and the breakdown of traditional values. |
| african american agriculture history: Populist Vanguard Robert C. McMath Jr., 2017-10-10 Significant as a political, economic, and social organization, the southern Farmers' Alliance was the largest and most influential farmers' organization in the history of the United States until the rise of the American Farm Bureau Federation. McMath suggests that the ideas advanced by the People's party in the 1890s had been incubated within the alliance and that the shared experience of 1.5 million rural Americans helped give those ideas power in the Populist crusade. Originally published 1976. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value. |
| african american agriculture history: Commercial Agriculture, the Slave Trade and Slavery in Atlantic Africa Robin Law, Suzanne Schwarz, Silke Strickrodt, 2013 This book considers commercial agriculture in Africa in relation to the trans-Atlantic slave trade and the institution of slavery within Africa itself, from the beginnings of European maritime trade in the fifteenth century to the early stages of colonial rule in the twentieth century. From the outset, the export of agricultural produce from Africa represented a potential alternative to the slave trade: although the predominant trend was to transport enslaved Africans to the Americas to cultivate crops, there was recurrent interest in the possibility of establishing plantations in Africa to produce such crops, or to purchase them from independent African producers. This idea gained greater currency in the context of the movement for the abolition of the slave trade from the late eighteenth century onwards, when the promotion of commercial agriculture in Africa was seen as a means of suppressing the slave trade. At the same time, the slave trade itself stimulated commercial agriculture in Africa, to supply provisions for slave-ships in the Middle Passage. Commercial agriculture was also linked to slavery within Africa, since slaves were widely employed there in agricultural production. Although Abolitionists hoped that production of export crops in Africa would be based on free labour, in practice it often employed enslaved labour, so that slavery in Africa persisted into the colonial period. Robin Law is Emeritus Professor of African History, University of Stirling; Suzanne Schwarz is Professor of History, University of Worcester; Silke Strickrodt is Visiting Research Fellow at the Department of African Studies and Anthropology, University of Birmingham. |
| african american agriculture history: American Grown Michelle Obama, 2012-05-29 #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The former First Lady, author of Becoming, and producer and star of Waffles + Mochi tells the inspirational story of the White House Kitchen Garden and how gardens can transform our lives and the health of our communities. Early in her tenure as First Lady, despite being a novice gardener, Michelle Obama planted a kitchen garden on the White House’s South Lawn. To her delight, she watched as fresh vegetables, fruit, and herbs sprouted from the ground. Soon the White House Kitchen Garden inspired a new conversation all across the country about the food we feed our families and the impact it has on the nutrition and well-being of our children. In American Grown, Mrs. Obama invites you inside the White House Kitchen Garden, from the first planting to the satisfaction of the seasonal harvest. She reveals her early worries and struggles—would the new plants even grow?—and her joy as lettuce, corn, tomatoes, collards and kale, sweet potatoes and rhubarb flourished in the freshly tilled soil. She shares the stories of other gardens that have moved and inspired her on her journey across the nation. And she offers what she learned about planting your own backyard, school, or community garden. American Grown features: • a behind-the-scenes look at every season of the garden’s growth • unique recipes created by White House chefs • striking original photographs that bring the White House garden to life • a fascinating history of community gardens in the United States From a modern-day vegetable truck that brings fresh produce to underserved communities in Chicago, to Houston office workers who make the sidewalk bloom, to a New York City school that created a scented garden for the visually impaired, to a garden in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, that devotes its entire harvest to those less fortunate, American Grown isn’t just the story of a single garden. It’s a celebration of the bounty of our nation and a reminder of what we can all grow together. |
| african american agriculture history: Legacy of the New Farmers of America, The Antoine J. Alston, Ph.D., Dexter B. Wakefield, Ph.D., and Netta S. Cox, M.S.Ed., M.L.S., 2022-05-02 African Americans have contributed greatly to the history of American agriculture. One of its most compelling stories is the New Farmers of America (NFA), which was a national organization of Black farm boys studying vocational agriculture in the public schools throughout 18 states in the eastern and southern United States from 1927 to 1965. The organization was started at the suggestion of Dr. H.O. Sargent, federal agent for agricultural education for Blacks, who felt the time was ripe for an organization of Black agricultural students. Operating within the auspices of the Separate but Equal Doctrine, the NFA started at Virginia State University in May 1927 with a few chapters and members and concluded in 1965 with more than 1,000 chapters and more than 58,000 active members, merging with the Future Farmers of America (FFA) as a result of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.--Back cover. |
| african american agriculture history: Americans in Agriculture , 1990 |
| african american agriculture history: Afro-Americans in New Jersey Giles R. Wright, 1988 |
The Decline (and Revival?) of Black Farmers and Rural …
The African-American farmer is a rare breed in the United States. The loss of landownership and farming operations has contributed to the poverty of many rural communities in the South, …
African American Farmers and Civil Rights - JSTOR
Aug 10, 2017 · brought by African American farmers, with that familiar broken prom ise from the Civil War/Reconstruction era. The case concerned the sorry civil rights record of the U.S. …
Black Producers - National Agricultural Statistics Service
In 2017, the United States had 48,697 producers who identified as black, either alone or in combination with another race. They accounted for 1.4 percent of the country’s 3.4 million …
EXAMINING THE AFRICAN AMERICAN PERCEPTION OF …
With the dwindling numbers of African Americans enrolled in agricultural-related fields (Morgan, 2000), this research will strive to learn more about the essence of the lived experiences of …
African American Rural Culture, 1900–1950 - Open Scholarship
African American rural culture was quite diverse and represented interactions across institutional, religious, social, racial, class, recreational, and gen-der lines.
“Being stewards of land is our legacy”: Exploring the lived …
From this research, four primary themes emerged: (1) black farmers felt a combination of both autonomy and a need for community support; (2) they felt empow-ered through farming, while …
Refusing to be Dispossessed: African American Land …
took place in agriculture from the Great Depression throughout the late 20th century. African American farmers, however, were disproportionately affected. Historian Pete Daniel stated it …
History of Race and Racism in LandGrant System.Reading List
“The African American Farmer: Meeting the Production, Marketing, and Policy Challenges.” American Journal of Agricultural Economics 74(3):820-825. Comer, Marcus M., Thasya …
FOR INSIGHTS INTO THE HISTORICAL
AFRICAN-AMERICAN FARMERS AND THE FIGHT FOR SURVIVAL: THE CONTINUING EXAMINATION FOR INSIGHTS INTO THE HISTORICAL GENESIS OF THIS DILEMMA …
The Struggle for Control of America’s Production Agriculture …
The impact of corporate agriculture on African American farmers, however, might be felt most in the marketplace, espe-cially fruit and vegetable markets. African American farmers for the …
A History of African-American Farmer Cooperatives, 1938-2000
This paper has a twofold purpose to: 1) provide a chronology and historical background to the black farmer cooperatives that operate in the South today, and 2) examine their role in …
Highlights - National Agricultural Statistics Service
In 2012, the number of black farmers in the United States was 44,629. This was a 12 percent increase percent since 2007, when the last agriculture census was conducted. Nationally black …
Black Women in American Agriculture - JSTOR
AMERICAN AGRICULTURE This paper attempts to identify some of the major contributions and experiences of Black women in the development of American agricul-ture. Selected periods of …
History of Agriculture in the United States - CORE
The earliest practitioners of American agricultural history have largely been classed as “cows and plows” historians, devoted to the study of agricultural production, often from an economic point …
African American Agriculture History (Download Only)
Understanding African American agriculture history is not merely an academic exercise; it is essential for addressing the persistent racial inequalities that shape the current agricultural …
Black Farmers and the Agricultural Cooperative - JSTOR
Lou Ferleger, "Uplifting American Agriculture: Experiment Station Scientists and the Office of Experiment Stations in the Early Years after the Hatch Act," Agricultural History 64 (Spring …
Slavery and American Agricultural History
This essay considers the role of slavery in American agricultural history by examining the impact of political decisions during the period when the boundary between free and slave states was …
Introduction: African Americans in Southern Agriculture, 1877 …
findings on the incidence and meaning of African American landownership were unveiled, and little-known narratives of social contestation in the rural South were detailed.
Beyond 'Black Rice': Reconstructing Material and Cultural
In pursuit of the idea that enslaved African farmers introduced rice agriculture to the Americas, scholars have constructed an elaborate argument to make the case for this transatlantic …
A Short History of Africa - Stanford University
This is a short history of Africa excluding Egypt, Ethiopia and (Dutch and British) South Africa, which are the subjects of separate histories. Some of the history of these countries, however, is …
Historical Agriculture Secretary Timeline - IATP
Task Force. Espy was appointed Secretary of Agriculture on January 22, 1993, and is the first person of African American descent to hold the office. He served until December 31, 1994. …
Culture, food, and racism: the effects on African American …
Jul 24, 2018 · The purpose of this research is to shed light on the history of African American food patterns in the United States and how through institutionalized racism African Americans have …
An In-depth Look at Virginia Cooperative Extension's History
Pre 1800’s : The Early History of Virginia Agriculture The land, currently known as Virginia, has always thrived with agricultural activity. ... African American boys at Hampton Institute in 1915. …
PERSPECTIVES OF AFRICAN AMERICAN SCHOOL- BASED …
PERSPECTIVES OF AFRICAN AMERICAN SCHOOL-BASED AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION TEACHERS TOWARD THEIR MEANING OF WORK: A Q METHODOLOGY STUDY By COURTNEY PATRICE …
EXAMINING THE AFRICAN-AMERICAN PERCEPTION OF …
how African-American history has affected the number of African Americans pursuing careers in agriculture today. The results also opened up many new areas where research can be conducted …
The Historiography of American Agriculture
History teachers quickly will find that a single, authoritative text does not exist for a broad overview of American agricul tural history. William W. Cochrane's The Development of American …
THE PROBLEM OF AGRICULTURAL AND INDUSTRIAL …
the American workforce. This number includes approximately 12 million African Americans between the ages of 20 and 64. These African Americans represent roughly 10% of the civilian workforce …
Timeline of Agricultural Labor
We can see this history of exploitative conditions in the events and policies that laid the groundwork for our broken agricultural system today! ... Latin American Immigration • 1970s: As African …
Practice Test US History Answer Key - FLVS
! 2!!! SS.912.A.2.6! What!was!the!main!effect!of!the!system!of!debt!peonage!that!emerged!in!the!South!during!the!late!19th! …
AFRICAN AMERICAN LIFE AND HISTORY ASSOCIATION …
The 2025 Black History Month theme, African Americans, and Labor, focuses on the various and profound ways that work and. working of all kinds – free and unfree, skilled, and unskilled, …
Cash Crops and Freedom: Export Agriculture and - JSTOR
HISTORY The emergence of export agriculture began during the protracted aboli-tion of the Atlantic slave trade, decades before the European Scramble for ... and Liberia (independent under an …
Transformative Learning in an African American Agriculture …
Transformative Learning in an African American Agriculture Course . Courtney P. Brown. 1, Lauren Lewis Cline2, and J. Shane Robinson3. Abstract . Despite agricultural education’s prioritized …
African American Historic Places in South Carolina
and have important associations with African American history State Historic Preservation Office South Carolina Department of Archives and History ... mainly in agriculture and home economics. …
African Americans and Land Loss in Texas - JSTOR
twentieth century, but minorities, particularly African Americans, have left agriculture at a more rapid rate than white Americans. Between 1920 and ... The number of African American …
1890 Land-Grant Institutions and School- - JSTOR
If HBCUs employed more African American agriculture teachers, would more African American students be influenced to become interested in middle, high school, or university-level …
516016 Drake Journal of Agricultual Law 17.1 Lexis.ps
Brown, Black Women in American Agriculture, 50 AGRIC. HIST. 202, 202–12 (1976) (explaining the over-breadth of this general rule). 6. African American, Native American, and Hispanic farmers …
AGM OUTREACH RESOURCE - agriculture.ny.gov
State Fair to share history, purpose, and activities to expect this year. Attendees will enjoy presentations from leadership from the Pan-African Village, Latino Village, Asian Village, and …
Introduction: African Americans in Southern Agriculture, 1877 …
African Americans in Southern Agriculture, 1877-1945 PETER A. COCLANIS As a result of generations of extraordinarily rich scholarship, we now know a great deal about the roles of …
Roundtable: Why Does Agricultural History Matter?
Jun 19, 2019 · Department of African American Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His research focuses on the relationship between African American food systems, …
FREDERICK DOUGLASS - Gilder Lehrman Institute of …
an indefatigable leader in keeping African American history at the center of the larger American story, deftly bridging academic and public spheres. He is deeply missed. James O. Horton at the …
Impacts and Effects of Reconstruction in Texas - Texas …
African Americans, such as the Gregory Institute, the first grade-school for African Americans established by the Freedmen's Bureau in 1866. Gregory School Faculty, photograph, 1911; …
Historical Methodology and Writing the Liberian past: The Case …
African nationalist history in the 1960s and 1970s) suggests a general ... and Challenges (San Francisco, 1992), 161, 164; James Fairhead et al., eds. African American Exploration in West …
African-American Studies - Columbus City Schools
HMH African American History, Chapter 10. First Steps Toward Equality AAS Learning Target 7 Unit 7. Civil Rights Movement 4.5 weeks Unit 8. Black Lives Matter 4.5 weeks HMH African American …
Black Farmers and the Agricultural Cooperative - JSTOR
phasis on African Americans: II. The Hatch-George and Smith-Lever Acts," Agricultural History 65 (Spring 1991): 12-34. 4. Lou Ferleger, "Uplifting American Agriculture: Experiment Station …
American Agriculture A Brief History Rev Ed
American Agriculture A Brief History Rev Ed Richard L Allen American Agriculture R. Douglas Hurt,2002 R. Douglas Hurt's brief history of American agriculture, from the prehistoric period …
American Agriculture A Brief History Rev Ed
Readings in the History of American Agriculture Wayne David Rasmussen,2003 Problems of Plenty R. Douglas Hurt,2002 A compact narrative history of American agriculture over the last century, …
A Companion to American Agricultural History
Notes on Contributors J.L. Anderson is Professor of History at Mount Royal University, in Calgary, Alberta. He holds a PhD from Iowa State University and is the author of numerous publications, …
American Agriculture A Brief History Rev Ed
Readings in the History of American Agriculture Wayne David Rasmussen,2003 Problems of Plenty R. Douglas Hurt,2002 A compact narrative history of American agriculture over the last century, …
Florida’s State Academic Standards – Social Studies, 2023
9-12 African American History Strand SS.912.AA.1 Examine the causes, courses and consequences of the slave trade in the colonies from 1609-1776. SS.912.AA.1.1 Examine the condition of slavery …
Conflict and Connection: Rethinking Colonial African History
Colonial African History FREDERICK COOPER THIS ARTICLE IS PART OF AN EFFORT to bring historiographies of Africa, Latin America, and Asia-with their particular scholarly traditions, …
Tennessee Social Studies Standards - TN.gov
Tennessee history course for the second semester of fifth grade, while also opting to maintain Tennessee history content within third, fourth, and eighth grades; high school . U.S. history; and …
Practice Test US History - FLVS
! 2!! SS.912.A.2.6! The!excerpt!below!was!printed!in!amagazine!in!the!South!in!1866:! We!should!be!satisfied!to!compel!them!to!engage!in!coarse,!commonmanual!labor ...
The Voices of African American Agriculture Teachers in One …
African American agriculture teachers; merger ... A history of students seeking careers in agriculture began early in the 20th century, with two agricultural student organizations that …
A History of African-American Farmer Cooperatives, 1938 …
The history of African-American agriculture and cooperatives in the South demonstrates the role of cooperation in maintaining independent farmers. It manifests this role in a more pronounced way …
Beyond 'Black Rice': Reconstructing Material and Cultural …
2 Judith A. Carney, Black Rice: The African Origins of Rice Cultivation in the Americas (Cambridge, Mass., 2001). 3 David Eltis, Philip Morgan, and David Richardson, "Agency and Diaspora in …
AP World History - College Board
American populations through migrations of Europeans and enslaved Africans, but also by introducing new crops and domesticated animals.” ( Responds to the prompt with an evaluative …
AgricuLture, iron, And the bAntu PeoPLe - Englishkb
(A) African lakes and rivers already provided enough food for people to survive without agriculture. (B) The earliest examples of cultivated plants discovered in Africa are native to Asia. (C) Africa’s …
FOR INSIGHTS INTO THE HISTORICAL
The plight of the African-American farmer dramatizes the lingering and pernicious impact of this regressive jurisprudence. Current inter-est in the demise of African-American agriculture has …
Hoeing Their Own Row - npshistory.com
Board of Agriculture, for example, published in its 1961 annual report a “history of the development of Kansas Agriculture thru 100 years of statehood.” Not one minority person was named in the …
The 1619 Project: Utilizing the Theory of Planned Behavior to …
The 1619 Project explores the complexities of being an African American in the United States. As of fall 2020, more than 3,500 classrooms in the United States have used lesson plans designed ...
Conversations with Farmers: Oral History for Agricultural …
african american farm owners and their descendants across the South. The resulting interviews are housed in the Southern oral History Program collection, Southern His-torical collection, Wilson …
Landscapes of Technology Transfer: Rice Cultivation and …
6Roland PortLres, "Primary Cradles of Agriculture in the African Continent," in Papers in African Prehistory, ed. J. D. Fage and R. A. Oliver (Cambridge, 1970), pp. 43-58; Jack Harlan, J. De Wet, …
The History of African Development - aehnetwork.org
This book aims to draw experts in the field of African History, Economics and African Development Studies together around an open access textbook. The book is intended for teachers ...
The Origins of Agriculture - JSTOR
agriculture. The prehistorians of Gaboon might profitably plot savannah against early sites, to discover if there is obvious correlation. In West Africa the Late Lupemban pick may have …
History of Agriculture in the United States - CORE
African American Studies | Agricultural and Resource Economics | Environmental Studies | History of Gender | Women's Studies Comments This accepted book chapter is published as Riney …
Mercer University Penfield College
1. A grounding in the history of agriculture in coastal Georgia 2. A grounding in the history of African American farms and farmers in coastal Georgia 3. A grounding in issues of sustainability in …
Black History is Not American History: Toward a Framework …
way Black history should be taught is to seamlessly infuse Black history within the general American history narrative. Dr. Herron Keon Gaston captures the essence of the phrase when he states: …
History of African Trade
We are pleased to have commissioned this essay on the ‘History of African Trade’ by the distinguished Dr Emmanuel K. Akyeampong, Ellen Gurney Professor of History and of African and …
