Teaching African American psychology: Resources and strategies.

Abstract

African American psychology was virtually unknown 35 years ago. By the end of the 1990s, however, it had earned a solid place in U.S. college curricula. In this chapter, we provide a definition and description of the field, offer resources for instructors teaching African American Psychology, and describe specific strategies for classroom interaction. WHAT IS AFRICAN AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGY?Defining African American or Black psychology is difficult, because it is a constantly growing and changing field (see Jones, 1999aJones, , 2003. It may be distinguished from European American or White psychology in a number of ways (Fairchild, 2000). Specifically, it tends to: (a) emphasize the collective, with the group and not the individual as the unit of analysis; (b) consider current behavior within a historical context (vs. the ahistorical tendency of 195