African American History Through the Lens of the Black Church
This five-lesson course examines the central role of the Black Church in shaping African American history from slavery to the Civil Rights Movement. Students will explore how this institution served as the foundation for spiritual sustenance, community organization, cultural preservation, and social transformation across four centuries.
The course traces the Black Church from its African roots and the "Invisible Institution" of secret slave worship, through its explosive growth during Reconstruction and its role as a sanctuary during Jim Crow, to its complex relationship with the Harlem Renaissance and its pivotal function as the organizational and spiritual engine of the Modern Civil Rights Movement.
Through engaging narratives, students will meet key figures including Richard Allen, Harriet Tubman, Nat Turner, Ida B. Wells, Thomas Dorsey, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., while discovering how spirituals became freedom songs, sermons inspired social movements, and faith transformed oppression into liberation.
This course reveals an essential truth: to understand African American history, you must understand the Black Church—the one institution African Americans have continuously controlled and the cornerstone of their survival, resistance, and triumph.
Ideal for: Students of history, religious studies, African American studies, social movements, and anyone seeking to deepen their understanding of American history and the power of faith in the struggle for justice.
ur text here...