LibGuides: Racial Justice & Diversity Resources: Home

Introduction

This guide is intended to give some context to the racial justice movement taking place in the United States following the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery in early 2020. Their deaths coupled with racism and discrimination that have always been a part of the American landscape have been illuminated by further disparities surrounding COViD-19.

This guide contains library and internet resources that cover a number of issues related to the racial justice movement, including information on policing and mass incarceration, disparities in health and environmental justice as well as information on slavery and the civil rights movement to provide some context for the issues herein. There are also pages with information on understanding and addressing racism and resources for getting involved and advocacy. Use the tabs at the top of the guide to navigate through the resources.

This guide is an evolving work in progress. If you have resources that you would like to see as part of this guide, please email kclay@wcl.american.edu.

Finding Books in the Catalog

Use these subject headings to find relevant books in the library catalog

Reference Librarian

Khelani Clay

Email Me

Library Databases

Slavery in America and the World: History, Culture & Law [HeinOnline]
This HeinOnline collection brings together a multitude of essential legal materials on slavery in the United States and the English-speaking world. It includes every statute passed by every colony and state on slavery, every federal statute dealing with slavery, and all reported state and federal cases on slavery.
NAACP Papers
Digitized archives of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). This archive examines the realities of segregation and coverage spans from 1909 to 1972. Includes nearly 2 million pages of internal memos, legal briefings and direct action summaries from the association's offices throughout the United States.
Federal Surveillance of African Americans, 1920-1984
Contains files of the FBI Counterintelligence Program (CONTELPRO) from 1956 to 1971 on prominent black Americans and their organizations.
HistoryMakers
An African-American oral history collection, featuring interviews with thousands of individuals from the worlds of art, business, entertainment, politics, religion, science, and sports.
Black Studies Center
Includes the Schomburg Studies on the Black Experience, the International Index to Black Periodicals, the Black Literature Index, and more.
Black Thought & Culture
Black Thought and Culture is a landmark electronic collection of approximately 100,000 pages of non-fiction writings by major American black leaders—teachers, artists, politicians, religious leaders, athletes, war veterans, entertainers, and other figures—covering 250 years of history. In addition to the most familiar works, Black Thought and Culture presents a great deal of previously inaccessible material, including letters, speeches, prefatory essays, political leaflets, interviews, periodicals, and trial transcripts. The ideas of over 1,000 authors present an evolving and complex view of what it is to be black in America.
Civil RIghts & Social Justice [Hein]
HeinOnline’s Civil Rights and Social Justice database brings together a diverse offering of publications covering civil rights in the United States as their legal protections and definitions are expanded to cover more and more Americans. Containing links to more than 500 scholarly articles*, hearings and committee prints, legislative histories on the landmark legislation, CRS and GAO reports, briefs from major Supreme Court cases, and publications from the Commission on Civil Rights, this database allows users to educate themselves on the ways our civil rights have been strengthened and expanded over time, as well as how these legal protections can go further still. A varied collection of books on many civil rights topics and a list of prominent civil rights organizations help take the research beyond HeinOnline.
Open Society Justice Initiative [Hein]
The Justice Initiative publishes reports, handbooks, briefing papers, legal and policy submissions, and fact sheets exploring and advocating on issues of human rights and justice.
Exploring Race in Society
Includes essays, articles, primary resources and government agency reports that address topic such as affirmative action, BLM, environmental racism, food insecurity, police brutality, etc.

This database is free to the public courtesy of EBSCO.

Links of Interest

Racial Justice & Diversity Resources

State Net® Legislative & Regulatory Updates on Racial Equality & Police Reform
Tracks executive, legislative and regulatory actions on the local level that impact policing and racial justice. Also allows users to sign up for daily updates. Gives full text reports by juridiction.
Lexis Practice Advisor Protester’s Rights Resource Kit
The complimentary Protesters’ Rights Resource Kit from Lexis Practice Advisor® features LexisNexis-related content and links to publicly available content from various U.S.-based legal advocacy groups including the ACLU, The Legal Aid Society, and other organizations that are working to increase police accountability, promote civil rights, equal rights, and access to justice.

Courses

To Be Welcoming
Two years ago, Starbucks asked Arizona State University to develop an online curriculum for all Starbucks employees that is intended to drive reflection and conversation on the topic of bias.

Now Starbucks is making those courses available to the public at no cost.

The interactive courses were created by ASU faculty experts to share research and information that can help people to think about how they view the world and to consider how other people experience it.

Pence Law Library Guides

Racial Justice & Diversity Resources: Home