Drawing the Color Line: How was the Idea of Race Constructed?
From: A People's History of the United States, History is a Weapon, and Zinn Education Project
Grade Level: (HS), (College)
Remote Ready: With Modifications
Time: 1 Class Period if reading is done for homework
Length of Reading: Chapter
Link: The Color Line
Colonial elites created laws to keep poor white indentured servants, blacks, and Indians apart. Read about it in Chapter 2: "Drawing the Color Line" from A People's History of the United States. This chapter from Howard Zinn's book is made available for free online by History is a Weapon.
The Color Line activity at Zinn Education Project goes with this chapter. Using a list of questions (see last page of download), students first predict laws that would keep these parties apart. Then they check their answers by reading the chapter mentioned in the previous paragraph.
More Information:
Grade Level:
(HS), (College): There is no specified age group for this activity; however, we think it would be well suited for high school and college students
This Activity Involves:
Secondary Source: This activity utilizes secondary sources.
Group Work: This activity calls for working in pairs or groups or having a group discussion.
Image: Blake, W. O. 1860. “Decks of a Slave Ship” in The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade, Ancient and Modern : the Forms of Slavery that Prevailed in Ancient Nations, Particularly in Greece and Rome : the African Slave Trade and the Political History of Slavery in the United States, Columbus.Ohio : H. Miller. Smithsonian Libraries, https://library.si.edu/image-gallery/68463. Accessed: 7.1.2020.
