Limiting Opportunity
This reading covers an excerpt from The Autobiography of Malcolm X, where Malcolm Little's teacher told him his race limited the career opportunities available to him.
Challenging Racist Assumptions
This reading contains an excerpt of Horace Mann Bond's response to the racist ideas put forward in Carl Brigham’s A Study of American Intelligence.
Identity and Belonging (UK)
Author Sarfraz Manzoor writes about the experiences that shaped his understanding of what it means to be British and what it means to belong.
Doors to Opportunity
Read about the experiences of two young immigrants to the United States in the late 1800s and how race shaped the kind of education to each of them.
Racism and Intelligence Test Scores
Learn more about the history of intelligence tests and how test results were used to help justify discrimination in the 1900s.
Global Migration
Use these photographs of global migration to help students explore the experiences of individuals and groups who choose or are forced to leave their homelands.
“Emancipation” (1865)
Thomas Nast's celebration of the emancipation of Southern slaves with the end of the Civil War. Nast envisions a somewhat optimistic picture of the future of free blacks in the United States.
Ferguson Social Media Posts
A selection of tweets from citizens and news reports in response about the events in Ferguson, Missouri.
W.E.B. Du Bois Reflects on the Purpose of History
In 1935, W. E. B. Du Bois published an influential book titled Black Reconstruction in America. This audio excerpt, from a chapter titled “The Propaganda of History,” questions the ways in which Reconstruction was being studied and taught at the time.
Studs Terkel Interview with Emma Tiller
Studs Terkel interviews Emma Tiller, a cook who describes how African Americans would feed people who were in need during the Great Depression, without any regard to their skin color.
Studs Terkel Interview with Virginia Foster Durr
In an interview with Studs Terkel, Virginia Foster Durr, a prominent American civil rights activist, reflects on life during the Great Depression, particularly the way that people on government relief felt shame and guilt over their own suffering and poverty, rather than blaming the capitalist system.