Bibliography
African Americans in Ohio. Ohio History Center. Accessed May 2, 2020. http://dbs.ohiohistory.org/africanam/. A variety of interesting documents about African American history in Ohio.
Black Townships in Oklahoma. OETA. August 23, 2013. History of Boley, OK, mostly. Great photos that might reflect the community of the Bottom.
Christian, Barbara. “The Past Is Infinite: History and Myth in Toni Morrison's Trilogy.” Social
Identities 6, no. 4 (2000): 411–23. https://doi.org/doi:10.1080/13504630020026387.
DuBois, W.E.B., “Returning Soldiers,” The Crisis, XVIII (May, 1919), p. 13.
Farmer, James. "Chapter 5, Freedom--When?" National Humanities Center Toolbox Library: Primary Sources in U.S. History and Literature. Accessed July 14, 2020. http://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/pds/maai3/segregation/text7/jamesfarmer.pdf.
Farmer questions the virtues of desegregation and comes out in favor of
integration, but he makes points that support the validity of towns like those in Oklahoma and the novel.
Geisel, Theodor Seuss, and Richard H Minear. “The Old Run-Around.” Dr. Seuss Goes to War, The New Press, 1999, pp. 58–59. These two cartoons are about denial of black labor in war preparations.
Griffin, William W. "Mobilization of Black Militiamen in World War I: Ohio's Ninth Battalion." The Historian 40, no. 4 (August 1, 1978): 686-703. Accessed July 11, 2020. https://search.proquest.com/docview/1296473506?accountid=15172. This is the history of the black troops in Ohio (the setting of Sula) who became part of
the 93rd National Guard Division, the first all-black soldiers in WW I.
Hamilton, Kenneth Marvin. Black Towns and Profit: Promotion and Development in the Trans-Appalachian West, 1877-1915. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1991. A history of five all black towns west of the Appalachians. Used to compare and contrast to the community of the Bottom in Sula.
Historic Oklahoma All-black Towns Fight to Survive. February 16, 2017. Accessed July 28, 2020. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU8SoQvc50U. This brief video discussed the importance of preserving the history of Oklahoma's all-black towns through stories and movies and representing all parts of American history.
Homestead Development Association. "Homestead Development." Advertisement. The Union (Cincinnati), September 11, 1920. Assumedly for an all-black community because of its source, this advertisement is an interesting contrast to the origin and development of the Bottom, but also reflects the way some black towns were created for profit.
Hurston, Zora Neale. "Letter to the Orlando Sentinel." Orlando Sentinel, August 11, 1955. Accessed July 6, 2020. https://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/letter-to-the-orlando-sentinel/. Huston discusses the negative effects of forced desegregation, including loss of culture and character.
Jackson, Chuck. "A "Headless Display": Sula, Soldiers, and Lynching." MFS Modern Fiction Studies 2, no. 52 (Summer 2006): 374-92. Accessed June 20, 2020. doi:doi:10.1353/mfs.2006.0048. Includes an explanation of the horrendous treatment of black soldiers upon their return to America from WWI and a study of characters through that lens.
Joiner, William A. A Half Century of Freedom of the Negro in Ohio. Xenia, OH: Smith Adv. Co, 1915.
Lentz-Smith, Adriane. Freedom Struggles: African Americans and World War I. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/yale/Doc?id=10402528.
MacIntyre, W. Irwin. Colored Soldiers. Macon, Georgia: J.W. Burke Company, 1923. Accessed May 1, 2020. https://search.library.yale.edu/catalog/h008888871?counter=5. Fictional personal narratives of black soldiers in WWI. Awkwardly vernacular and inevitably offensive to most.
Marcucci, Olivia. "Zora Neale Hurston and the Brown Debate: Race, Class, and the Progressive Empire." The Journal of Negro Education 86, no. 1 (2017): 13-24. Accessed July 6, 2020. doi:doi:10.7709/jnegroeducation.86.1.0013. This article gives, though Hurston's eyes, an explanation of what the Bottom loses as it becomes more integrated in the "progress" of the 1960s.
Men of Bronze. United States: Killiam Shows, Inc., 1978. Accessed July 11, 2020. https://archive.org/details/menofbronze/menofbronze/menofbronzereel1.mov. Film about the soldiers who served with the French in WWI.
Morrison, Toni. Sula. New York, NY: Vintage International, 2004. This is the novel the unit is built around. The forward by the author is mentioned in the unit.
New Labor Committee Record Group 1925-1969. 2020. MS, Negro Labor Committee Records 1925-1969, New York Public Library, New York. Accessed July 13, 2020. https://www.nypl.org/sites/default/files/archivalcollections/pdf/MicroR1165-1181MG17.pdf. This secondary source is a succinct history of the Negro Labor Committee, created in 1935, about the middle of the novel's chronology. For student use in the unit.
Pippin, Horace. Horace Pippin Memoir of His Experiences in World War I. Excerpt from memoir, Digital Public Library of America, Http://dp.la/item/707f5f7469f9303c088eeeb7b3af0d4e. Excerpt from Horace Pippin, soldier serving with the French and being wounded in WW I.
Quillin, Frank Uriah. The Color Line in Ohio: A History of Race Prejudice in a Typical Northern State. Ann Arbor , MI: University of Michigan Historical Studies, 1913.
Renesch, E.G., and R.L Simpson. Colored Man Is No Slacker. 1918. World War I poster; young man bids farewell to his sweetheart as regiment approaches and marches past in background, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven. Idyllic image of young black man going off to war, saying goodbye to his love.
"Returning Soldiers (1919)." Oxford African American Studies Center, September 30, 2009. Accessed July 8, 2020. https://oxfordaasc.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780195301731.001.0001/acref-9780195301731-e-33765. A quick reference for the dense background of black soldiers in WWI.
Rogers, Leslie. "To Powerful To Keep Out!" Cartoon. The Chicago Defender, September 13, 1924. A cartoon showing the growing power of black organized labor in the 1920s. Published on the death of Samuel Gompers.
"Sexes Changing." The Union (Cincinnati), March 06, 20. http://dbs.ohiohistory.org/africanam/html/det5260-2.html?ID=997. This story gives us another lens with which to see our characters, many of whom have non-traditional gender roles. There is no stable, dependable male character in the novel.
Strickland, Jeff. "Teaching the History of Slavery in the United States with Interviews: Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938." Journal of American Ethnic History 33, no. 4 (Summer 2014): 41-48. Accessed June 15, 2020. https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5406/jamerethnhist.33.4.0041. The strategies and activities used in the article are the basis for at least on in this curriculum unit.
Wang, Hansi Lo, writer. "The Harlem Hellfighters: Fighting Racism In The Trenches Of
WWI." In All Things Considered. WFDD. April 1, 2014. This could be played in class as part of the unit. It's an engaging history of the Harlem Hellfighters, who fight alongside the 9th from Ohio.
Williams, Chad Louis. Torchbearers of Democracy: African American Soldiers and the Era of the First World War. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2010. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/yale/Doc?id=10425436.
Wineburg, Samuel S. Why Learn History (When It's Already on Your Phone). The University of Chicago Press, 2018. This book was our first read for our seminar and it laid out methods of teaching history that encouraged critical inquiry.
Woodford, C. H. "Rotten Eggs." Editorial. The Union (Cincinnati), November 13, 1920, 15th ed. http://dbs.ohiohistory.org/africanam/html/det45ac.html?ID=1266.
This short letter to the editor gives some credibility to the loose nature of Sula and illustrates scenes from the novel. the "rotten eggs" of the title are the loose women who grab for men of all colors.
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