West Africa, the Atlantic slave trade, and the Americas -- The colonial era : 1619-1763 -- The era of the American Revolution : 1764-1820 -- The antebellum years : 1820-1860 -- The Civil War and reconstruction : 1860-1877 -- The triumph of white racism : 1878-1915 -- World War I through the Great Depression : 1914-1941 -- World War II and the postwar years : 1941-1960 -- The civil rights revolution, Black power, and white backlash : 1960-1968 -- Progress and setbacks in a conservative era : 1969 to the present.