cans, because they were separated from their original culture, have always "viewed their generic name as intimately related to their selfesteem and their place in American society." ¹⁰ They note that until 1899 the designation African and its variants Afro-American,fAfricanAmerican, and Africo-American were the designations most used in describing the American black. ¹¹ However, starting in the 1830s about one-third of black magazines and newspapers used the word colored to refer to blacks; this number held until 1950. Although the use of African and Afro-American declined between 1900 and 1950, 28 percent of black publications continued to use these terms. ¹² Between 1872 and 1879 only 17 percent of the publications used the word Negro, but its acceptance by blacks became increasingly widespread after the Civil War. Blacks capitalized the word Negro to distinguish it from white southern usage, since white southerners capitalized the names of all but the black race. Between 1870 and 1930Negro continued to gain in popularity, especially among black intellectuals and in the black press, and by 1933 the United States Government Printing Office was using the word. Blasingame and Berry conclude that by 1950 Negro was the most popular designation. ¹³

During the activism of the 1960s, however, the terms black and Afro-American regained popularity, and "between 1960 and 1973 'black' appeared in 82 percent of the autobiographical works containing a racial designation in the title." ¹⁴ In the 1990s African-American has been used increasingly. ¹⁵ The terms African-American, black, and Negro are used throughout this book as the context dictates.

-xii-