This landmark guide covers research into every aspect of African-American life and work, offering a compendium of information and interpretation about almost 400 years of African-Americans' experiences as an ethnic group and as Americans.

The first part of the Guide contains 12 essays on historical research aids, from traditional archival and reference materials to the Internet. The second and largest part presents comprehensive and chronological bibliographies, prepared by John Thornton, Peter H. Wood, Gary B. Nash, Stephanie Shaw, Richard J. M. Blackett, Eric Foner, Leon F. Litwack, Joe W. Trotter, Jeffrey Conrad Stewart, Nancy L. Grant, Darlene Clark Hine, Clayborne Carson, John H. Bracey, Adam Biggs, and Corey Walker. The third part contains listings of resources on the special subjects of women, prepared by Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham; geographical areas; and autobiography and biography, prepared by Randall K. Burkett, Leon F. Litwack, and Richard Newman. A companion CD-ROM packaged with the book makes more than 15,000 bibliography entries available for computer searching.

Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham is Professor of History and of Afro-American Studies, Harvard University.

Leon F. Litwack is the Alexander F. and May T. Morrison Professor of American History Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley, where he received the Golden Apple Award for Outstanding Teaching in 2007. He also received a Pulitzer Prize in History, the Francis Parkman Prize, and the American Book Award. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Humanities Film Grant.

Darlene Clark Hine is John A. Hannah Professor of History, Michigan State University.

Randall K. Burkett is Curator of the African-American Collection, Emory University.

Read More by Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham:

• Righteous Discontent: The Women's Movement in the Black Baptist Church, 1880-1920

Read More by Leon F. Litwack:

• How Free Is Free? The Long Death of Jim Crow