AFS 2010 introduces students to examples, examining three texts, of the broader complexity of African American history and aesthetics that have evolved into a coherent collection of beliefs and practices that most African Americans have known longest as their own culture. We will seek to understand African American culture historically (not as ‘fashions’ or as ‘trends’ from limited period to period) but by examining the thoughts of three black authors in order to consider Black culture and aesthetics as a deep history. This is a history course, not a pop culture course of the sort often offered in a literature class.