Historical Dictionary of African American Cinema

The Historical Dictionary of African American Cinema includes hundreds of films, everything from The Birth of a Nation to Crash. In addition to the films, brief biographies of African American actors and actresses such as Sidney Poitier, James Earl Jones, Halle Berry, Eddie Murphy, Whoopi Goldberg, Denzel Washington, and Jamie Foxx are also detailed. This book provides a better understanding of the role African Americans played in film history through a chronology, a list of acronyms and abbreviations, an introductory essay, a bibliography, appendixes, photos, and hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries on actors, actresses, movies, producers, organizations, awards, film credits, and terminology.

Venise T. Berry is associate professor of journalism and mass communication at the University of Iowa.