The Routledge Atlas of African American History charts the history of blacks in the US from slavery to the present, using a combination of maps, charts and brief essays. Beginning with the first black Americans, a group of 20 people who had been sold to British colonists in 1619, this book charts the subsequent history of African Americans through to the 1990’s.

Economic development in the New World created a severe labour shortage which in turn ensured that Africans were transported to the colonies in ever-increasing numbers. African slave labour was vital to the economic success of British North America and the institution soon became most entrenched in those colonies that exported labour-intensive commodities like tobacco and rice.

The Routledge Atlas examines what life was like for these Africans including, for example, the impact of slave codes devised in the South codifying the fact that slaves were property not people. The slave codes produced laws which were enacted to protect this property, and to protect whites when their property became ‘troublesome’. Various slave rebellions are examined, including Nat Turner’s famed rebellion of 1831, the bloodiest in US history, while the dispersal and disenfranchisement of free blacks in the New Republic is revealed through comprehensive maps and tables.

Later chapters examine slavery in relation to the Civil War, including the mass migration of Southern blacks or "Exodusters" from the rural South to the North and West after Reconstruction. Somewhat surprisingly for an African American introduction, this book dedicates a whole chapter to the subject of blacks in the military, more attention in fact than it dedicates to the Civil Rights movement which is examined in much briefer detail. Here we learn that African Americans have fought in every major military action since colonial times although their contributions were minimised by larger society following the close of each conflict. This chapter closes with a mention of General Colin Powell, the first African American to be named Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, thus revealing the hard-earned gains achieved by contemporary black Americans.

All the key figures from African-American history are present in this study, although disappointingly, the Black Panther Party is barely mentioned. However, as a general introduction to African American studies this book provides an excellent overview of the fascinating subject of black history in the US, an area which is an integral aspect of any worthwhile American Studies programme.

Posted 21st February 2001