AP AfAM Unit 2 Supplemental Videos (pt. 1)
For the first half of unit two, I put together a list of videos that can be used with every topic of study for the unit. They vary in length from three minutes to 20 minutes. None of them are designed to substitute the video lectures I normally assign, but instead, they reinforce some of the most important concepts.
Throughout the year, I consistently use videos from Crash Course’s Black American History playlist. These are pretty well known, so I only included one of them in the list. Another reliable sources of videos have been the youtube channel Black History in Two Minutes or So hosted by Henry Louis Gates Jr - some of these are included in the list. Almost all of these videos can be found on YouTube.
I hope this list is helpful. If you have any videos that you use in your classrooms for this unit, please leave a comment with the video link and corresponding unit topic.
2.1 African Explorers in the Americas
The Little Known African Explorer of North America (4:52) This video covers the life of a Black explorer in New France, Mathieu Da Costa. His role as an interpreter aligns with the CED’s description of Atlantic Creoles.
The Role Of Africans In Early America (7:33) This video covers many different examples of early Africans in the Americas. It covers conquistadores, Juan Garrido, maroon communities, free artisans, and enslavement.
2.2 Departure Zones in Africa and the Slave Trade to the United States
Why did Europeans Enslave Africans? (9:17) This PBS Origins video covers the reason for Europeans looked to Africa to meet the labor needs of their American colonies. As part of the explanation, the video covers the diverse regions from which enslaved Africans were taken.
2.3 Capture and the Impact of the Slave Trade on West African Societies
Life Aboard a Slave Ship | History (9:17) This PBS Origins video covers the reason for Europeans looked to Africa to meet the labor needs of their American colonies. As part of the explanation, the video covers the diverse regions from which enslaved Africans were taken.
2.4 African Resistance on Slave Ships and the Antislavery Movement
(60 Minutes) The last known slave ship | 60 Minutes Archive (13:29) This video covers the Clotilda, the last slave ship to transport enslaved Africans to the United States in 1860. The 60 Minutes story interviews the descendants of those who were transported on the Clotilda. Similarly to the Stowage art piece in the CED, the video highlights how the slave ship is a symbol of enslavement for contemporary African Americans.
2.5 Slave Auctions and the Domestic Slave Trade
Second Middle Passage (3:05) This video explains the Second Middle Passage, the massive forced migration of over one million enslaved African Americans from the Upper South to the cotton-producing Lower South between the invention of the cotton gin in 1793 and the Civil War, which devastated Black families and communities
2.6 Labor, Culture, and Economy
A Vanishing History: Gullah Geechee Nation (14:34) This Vice News report covers the history of Gullah Geechee nation and some contemporary issues of land development that threaten their community.
2.7 Slavery and American Law: Slave Codes and Landmark Cases
The Slavery Lawsuit They Didn’t Teach You in School (11:46) this PBS video highlights the life of Mum Bett and her freedom lawsuit in the state of Massachusetts during the Revolutionary period.
The Racist Origins of U.S. Law (13:15) This video explains how U.S. law has historically promoted discrimination, tracing a line from colonial-era slave codes and the system of chattel slavery through Jim Crow, convict leasing, and the "war on drugs" policies that led to mass incarceration.
2.8 The Social Construction of Race and the Reproduction of Status
Elizabeth Key: Crash Course Black American History #3 (6:27) This PBS report covers the origin of spirituals and its evolution into the genre of Gospel music. It covers the different messages that were written into the lyrics of spirituals that enslaved people used.
2.9 Creating African American Culture
Negro Spirituals: The Music That Helped Free Enslaved African Americans | ABJ Clip (6:27) This PBS report covers the origin of spirituals and its evolution into the genre of Gospel music. It covers the different messages that were written into the lyrics of spirituals that enslaved people used.
Why this instrument explains Black American folk music (9:01) This video by Vox describes the history of the banjo instrument and how it descended from west African instruments.
2.10 Black Pride, Identity, and the Question of Naming
Why Do We Say “African American”? (9:26) This video explains the history of ethnonyms used by and for people of African descent in the U.S., such as "colored," "Negro," "Black," and "African American," detailing how these terms evolved through debates over identity, self-determination, and acts of political reclamation by figures like W.E.B. Du Bois and Jesse Jackson
2.11 The Stono Rebellion and Fort Mose
The Stono Rebellion: Crash Course Black American History #6 (12:00) This video from Crash Course explains the 1739 Stono Rebellion in South Carolina, an uprising, detailing its causes, bloody suppression, and the subsequent enactment of harsh slave codes designed to prevent future revolts by restricting enslaved people's ability to learn, assemble, and organize