Black Americans And African American History

Black Americans / African Americans
An overview
Black Americans or African American trace their ancestry to slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Apart from white Americans, they constitute the second largest racial and ethnic minority group in America after the Hispanics.

According to the US Census Bureau in 2012, there are estimated 44,456,009 African Americans in the United States. That is about 14.1% out of the total American population of 313.9 Million. About 50% of the African American population live in the South.

The majority of African Americans are Christians, with a significant Protestant majority, with many of them following black churches which refer to churches with predominantly Black congregations. About 1% of Blacks are Muslims.

During the early part of the history of the United States, Black Americans were enslaved and treated as inferior people until after the Emancipation Declaration signed by President Lincoln came into effect during the Civil War. The elimination of racial segregation in 1968 and the struggle by the Civil Rights Movement which led to the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 were notable milestones in Black American history. This culminated in the election of Barack Obama as the first Black President of the UNited States which is considered to the high point for the Black American community.

i) Historically, subsequent to the abolition of slavery, Blacks were subjected to racial segregation and disenfranchisement in the Southern states and were threatened with acts of violence for failure to comply. More of such discriminatory laws were enacted across the United States in the later part of the 19th century. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored ...

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... blacks forming the highest percentage of welfare recipients. . They also lag behind in education and job skills and consequently employment opportunities. Blacks, more than any other communities, apart from Arabs, are subjected to racial profiling by the police. the have been subjected to police ill treatment and shootings by trigger happy police. We can recall the brutal police beating of Rodney King in 1991 and the numerous incidents of blacks shot dead by police are examples of police ill treatment and racial profiling of blacks. Indeed, the per capita crime rate among blacks is higher than that of any other community and the incarceration rate of blacks is higher than any other community. Seen together, these show that blacks continue to be disadvantaged economically and socially and are not treated fairly.

Sources:
http://blackdemographics.com/