A wide-ranging collection of African American history and culture is now available for online access at The Indianapolis Public Library.
“The American Mosaic: The African American Experience,” which received the Education Software Review Award (EDDIE), gives voice to the African American experience from its African origins to the present day. Its subject matter includes history, literature, arts, popular culture, folklore, business, slavery, civil rights, politics, sports, education and more. Specialized topics include “Africans in Colonial North America,” “The Rise of Jim Crow,” and “The Black Power Movement.”
Content is derived from nearly 8,000 primary and secondary sources, including the full text of overview essays, biographies, slave narratives, court cases and quotations. In addition to more than 50 topical overviews, the e-Resource features almost 1,000 biographies of such political and social figures as W.E.B. DuBois, Frederick Douglas, Mary McLeod Bethune and Barack Obama, as well as fascinating contemporary figures such as Amiri Baraka, Muhammad Ali and Oprah Winfrey.
Users also can research by selecting from fourteen “era” designations from the year 500 to the present. For the Civil Rights Movement (1954 – 1965) section, for example, this multimedia e-resource contains hundreds of primary source documents, images, photographs and audio clips that provide a birds-eye view of this pivotal period in black history. Basic and advanced search options can help the user in finding the most relevant results.
Another key feature allows for school or community discussion on such questions as “Would the Constitution have been ratified if it had outlawed or excluded slavery?,” “Was Abraham Lincoln the Great Emancipator?” and “Did Booker T. Washington’s philosophy offer the best policy for African Americans?”
“The American Mosaic: The African American Experience” is the latest in the Library’s collection of more than 80 free online databases available for access with a Library card. It can be found from “Articles and Databases” link on the Library’s homepage at www.indypl.org.
