Black History Bulletin Now Hosted on Project MUSE
By Project MUSE
The Association for the Study of African American Life and History, widely known as the founders of Black History Month, has selected Project MUSE to host its journal, Black History Bulletin. Black History Bulletin is a scholarly journal dedicated to enhancing teaching and learning in the areas of history and to publish, generate, and disseminate peer-reviewed information about African Americans in U. S. history, the African Diaspora generally, and the peoples of Africa.
The Black History Bulletin was founded in 1937 by Carter G. Woodson, known as “The Father of Black History,” in response to a request from Mary McLeod Bethune – founder of Bethune-Cookman College and member of the board of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History – that the Association create a publication that would serve the needs of teachers and general readers. The result was the Negro History Bulletin, now known as the Black History Bulletin.
The journal from the Association for the Study of African American Life and History is among the more than 40 titles that have joined Project MUSE’s expanded journal hosting program this year. Titles in the program are not included in the MUSE journal collections, but libraries may take up individual subscriptions to access the titles on the platform. A Premium Plus Package containing almost all of the hosted journals, including Black History Bulletin, is also now available for subscription.
Founders of Black History Month
Each year the question is asked: Why does Black History Month occur in February? The relevance of can be traced back to 1926, when ASALH’s founder Dr. Carter G. Woodson first established “Negro History Week” during the second week of February, because it encompasses the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass—both great American symbols of freedom. However, Woodson never confined Negro History to a week, believing instead that it should be incorporated into teaching year-round, with the week set aside as a time for students celebrate their knowledge gained and its role in the ongoing struggle for racial equality.
Decades later, ASALH sought recognition from the federal government, to set aside the month of February in official observance of Black Americans’ contributions to the history of the United States and the world. In 1986, which was also the first year of the celebration of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday as a national holiday, the U.S. Congress, in a joint resolution of the House and Senate, designated the month of February as “National Black History Month.”Each year the association develops the annual theme. MUSE is pleased to facilitate the study of Black history this month, and year-round, through hosting journals like Black History Bulletin and many other scholarly publications in the field.
“The Black History Bulletin offers educators a rich corpus of peer-reviewed scholarship to enhance the teaching and learning of Black history” said Liz Brown, Publisher Relations Manager for Journals at Project MUSE. “We’re thrilled the Association has chosen the MUSE platform to host and expand the dissemination of their work, and it’s especially exciting to be working with the association that founded, and continues to support through its programming and educational outreach, Black History Month.”
We are excited to expand our partnership with Project MUSE through their hosted journals program,” said Sylvia Cyrus, Executive Director of the Association for the Study of African American Life & History and Manager Editor of the Black History Bulletin. “We look forward to giving our subscribers access to this wonderful platform and helping our members and new scholars find and engage with our content.”
Content from the Black History Bulletin is now available on the MUSE platform. Libraries wishing to subscribe or needing to renew subscriptions to the journal may do so via their usual subscription agency, or by emailing jrnlcirc@jhu.edu or via our online form (requires creation of a user account). Note that fulfillment for hosted journals on MUSE is provided by the Johns Hopkins University Press Journals Division. MUSE will distribute metadata for the title to our many discovery partners, and subscribing libraries will be able to access custom holdings data and COUNTER-compliant usage statistics through the MUSE Library Dashboard. Current content for the Black History Bulletin was previously hosted on JSTOR.
About The Association for the Study of African American Life and History
Established on September 9, 1915 by Dr. Carter G. Woodson, we are the Founders of Black History Month and carry forth the work of our founder, the Father of Black History.
We continue his legacy of speaking a fundamental truth to the world–that Africans and peoples of African descent are makers of history and co-workers in what W. E. B. Du Bois called, “The Kingdom of Culture.” ASALH’s mission is to create and disseminate knowledge about Black History, to be, in short, the nexus between the Ivory Tower and the global public. We labor in the service of Blacks and all humanity.
About Project MUSE
Project MUSE has offered libraries affordable access to essential humanities and social science research for more than 25 years, as an integral part of the scholarly communications ecosystem and platform of choice for respected not-for-profit publishers. Currently, Project MUSE is the trusted and reliable source for over 700 journals and over 80,000 books, from more than 200 of the world's leading university presses and scholarly societies. MUSE also hosts thousands of open access books and several open access journal titles, freely available to anyone worldwide. Project MUSE's recently expanded and enhanced Hosted Journals Program offers an affordable, comprehensive electronic publishing service aligned with the mission and values of not-for-profit publishers. Hosted journal content benefits from being part of a large corpus of related scholarly material on the MUSE platform, providing a seamless user experience and enhanced discovery opportunities.
