This blog is part of a new course in African American Studies at the University of Houston, titled “Before Cowboy Carter: Black Towns, Black Freedom”. This blog serves as a forum for the course, featuring student work, class resources, and a description of the course for a wider audience to engage with the topics discussed. The aim of this course is to not only help students understand the history of the Black west behind Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter album, but to also use music as a way to connect the dis-remembered past back together and walk through this world of Black Towns, Black freedom, and Black Cowboys across the country from the 1700s to the present day.

This course uses Beyoncé’s latest album as a springboard to dive into the past and explore the influences of Black men and women in building the American West and the multiple pathways to Black freedom that existed beyond the mainstream Juneteenth story. This course highlights a long legacy of Black Towns, Black Cowboys, Black Country Western music, and Black freedom in America that offers an important backdrop to understanding the history behind the music of Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter album.

Through this blog the students will explore and trace the stories of Black families and their arrival stories in the West and the myriad ways they sought freedom for themselves from the gold rush, to the Underground Railroad, to the battlefield, and forced removal to Oklahoma, to the establishment of Black colleges, towns, and institutions that simultaneously changed the landscape of the American West and the course of history. By centering the role that Black and Indigenous people played in building America’s frontier and the lasting impact of the over 1,200 Black Towns and Freedom Colonies built across the country for the last 300 years, this student blog will highlight the ways we can traverse the history of the American West from the perspective of the Black men, women and children who carved out spaces for themselves, lived through these times and left part of their stories behind for us to find.