The Role of AP® African American Studies by Krystle Merchant

Krystle Merchant

​Engage with any news content right now and you’ll hear someone declare that it is a critical moment for American democracy. And while that is true, there are few moments in the last 250 years that are not critical for American democracy, whether they are taught or thought of in that way. The AP® African American Studies course provides an essential framework to understand how each of those past moments brought us to this one, by examining the meaning and impact of pluralist politics, culture, participation in the public sphere, and identity.

The AP® African American Studies course brings together critical lenses from multiple disciplines and asks students to build a context for college-level academic study. Students will encounter the rich complexities of African societies prior to European encounters and trace the evolution of global diasporic identities and cultural connections through twentieth century independence movements and into the digital present. They will have a chance to investigate the artistic traditions, political strategies, and intellectual trends that have shaped African American representation, conflict, and advancement across regions and eras. Students will use the methods and evaluation tools developed by leading scholars to question data, media, and other sources that capture the Black experience at the intersections of gender, class, sexuality, and ethnic identity. 

In order to face this moment and rise to its challenges, we have to prepare our students. Throughout the last two centuries, Black writers, creators, and thinkers have pointed to the critical importance of African American histories and communities to an understanding of American identity. When we neglect to incorporate these stories and theoretical concepts, or reduce them to where they can be seamlessly integrated into the mainstream, we fail to see how those seams, those complexities, those moments are what constitute the fabric of American democracy, at its weakest and strongest points. The AP® African American Studies course is the preparation our students need to build the competencies that will be required in their futures.