The Church in the southern Black community, 1780-1925

About this book

Compilation of printed texts from the libraries at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill documenting how Southern African Americans experienced and transformed Protestant Christianity into the central institution of community life. Presents a collected history how Southern African Americans experienced and transformed Protestant Christianity into the central institution of community life. Coverage begins with white churches' conversion efforts, especially in the post-Revolutionary period, and depicts the tensions and contradictions between the egalitarian potential of evangelical Christianity and the realities of slavery. Through slave narratives, autobiographies, biographies, church documents, sermons, histories, encyclopedias, and other observations by African American authors, the presentation focuses on how the black community adapted evangelical Christianity, making it a metaphor for freedom, community, and personal survival. An award from the Library of Congress/Ameritech National Digital Library Competition supported digitization of 100 titles. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill supplemented these titles with additional texts illuminating the same theme.