Found a new topic and want to explore more? Interested in creating your own exhibit? Here are some great open-access resources!
Recommended Journals/Databases
Your Gateway to the American Revolution
Created, researched, curated, and maintained by Edward St. Germain (1945 - 2009), it contains scores of scholarly writings, plus many links to museums, historical groups, experts, and collectors.
Archive Journal focuses on the use and theory of archives and special collections in higher education.The academic community has invested deeply in the preservation, use, and digitization of materials in special collections, and Archive Journal provides the space to reflect on this investment.
This 6,000 page reference center is dedicated to providing information to the general public on African American history and the history of more than one billion people of African ancestry around the world. We invite you to explore and use all the resources of BlackPast.
Boston: National Park Services
Discover how one city could be the Cradle of Liberty, site of the first major battle of the American Revolution, and home to many who espoused that freedom can be extended to all. Boston's Freedom Trail comprises sites that have witnessed almost 400 years of history. Come experience what they have to offer!
The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice
The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice at Harvard Law School (CHHIRJ) was launched in September 2005 by Charles J. Ogletree, Jr., Jesse Climenko Professor of Law. The Institute honors and continues the unfinished work of Charles Hamilton Houston, one of the 20th century’s most important legal scholars and litigators.
The Colored American Magazine*
The Colored American Magazine was the first American monthly publication that covered African-American culture. The magazine ran from May 1900 to November 1909. It has a wealth of information on culture, politics, and art of the early 20th-century Black life. To see more about the history of the periodical itself, check out its website here!
The David Walker Memorial Project*
This site has detailed information about David Walker and his work. You can read about his life, his famous anti-slavery pamphlet, Walker’s Appeal to the Colored Citizens of the World, and his influence on the abolitionist movement. You can also learn what life was like for Black people in Boston, Massachusetts where Walker spent his most influential years.
The Digital Public Library of America*
The Digital Public Library of America empowers people to learn, grow, and contribute to a diverse and better-functioning society. We do this by maximizing public access to our shared history, culture, and knowledge.DPLA connects people to the riches held within America’s libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural heritage institutions. All of the materials found through DPLA—photographs, books, maps, news footage, oral histories, personal letters, museum objects, artwork, government documents, and so much more—are free and immediately available in digital format.
Harvard BlackLetter Law Journal
Originally founded in 1983 by the Black Law Students Association, the Harvard BlackLetter Law Journal is an annual publication edited by students at Harvard Law School.BlackLetter is committed to publishing manuscripts that address social and economic issues affecting racial and ethnic minorities as well as innovative works by minority scholars and students.
The Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television
The Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television is an international and interdisciplinary journal concerned with the history of the audio-visual mass media from c.1900 to the present. It explores the institutional and ideological contexts of film, radio and television, analyses the evidence produced by the mass media for historians and social scientists, and considers the impact of mass communications on political, social and cultural history.
The Historical Journal of Massachusetts
The Historical Journal of Massachusetts (HJM) is a peer-reviewed journal published twice a year by the History Department at Westfield State University. As the only scholarly journal devoted exclusively to the history of Massachusetts, it fills an important role. Since 1972, the journal has published articles by well-known historians, along with cutting-edge research by graduate students, middle and high school history teachers, amateur history buffs, and countless local historians who have labored to uncover and rediscover the fascinating history of a pioneering state.
International Journal of Heritage Studies
The International Journal of Heritage Studies is the interdisciplinary academic, refereed journal for scholars and practitioners with a common interest in heritage. The Journal encourages debate over the nature and meaning of heritage as well as its links to memory, identities and place. Articles may include issues emerging from Heritage Studies, Museum Studies, History, Tourism Studies, Sociology, Anthropology, Memory Studies, Cultural Geography, Law, Cultural Studies, and Interpretation and Design.
The Massachusetts Archives holds the official records created by Massachusetts state government. Holdings are organized by agency and date from 1629 to the present. Be sure to check out their Black History Resources. If you are able, you can also visit them in person.
Museum of African American History (MAAH)*
The Museum of African American History is New England’s largest museum dedicated to preserving, conserving and interpreting the contributions of African Americans. In Boston and Nantucket, the Museum has preserved two historic sites and two Black Heritage Trails that tell the story of organized black communities from the Colonial Period through the 19th century.
Since 1978, The Public Historian has made its mark as the definitive voice of the public history profession, providing historians with the latest scholarship and applications from the field. The journal regularly publishes peer-reviewed articles on public policy and policy analysis; and federal, state, and local history; with emphasis on their effects on the particularly marginalized groups such as the economically disadvantaged, the LGBTQ community, and the Black and other minority groups.
Scholar Commons, a service of the University of South Florida Tampa Library, is a virtual showcase for USF's research and creative energies. It has an array of open-access articles that focus on a variety of topics. All articles are curated by a number of different student and faculty lead groups on USF's campus. These are articles are a perfect starting point for joining the conversations already in progress in academia.
The Trotter Review is a journal that addresses current Black studies, race, and race relations in the United States and abroad. Published by the William Monroe Trotter Institute for the Study of Black Culture at the University of Massachusetts Boston, the Review has a special focus on Boston and Massachusetts, but its content extends beyond the city and state.
*Starred items are sites we strongly suggest for their quality and direct alignment with EBBDA!