cans, because they were separated from their original culture, have
always "viewed their generic name as intimately related to their self-
esteem and their place in American society." ¹⁰ They note that until
1899 the designation African and its variants Afro-American,fAfrican-
American, 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 per-
cent of black publications continued to use these terms. ¹² Between
1872 and 1879 only 17 percent of the publications used the word Ne-
gro, 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 Of-
fice 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 contain-
ing 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.

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