African American¶
Political Rhetoric, 1989
Black.
Apparently traceable as far back as 1782 in a Philadelphia newspaper, the phrase was popularized by Jesse Jackson in 1989 at a meeting of 75 black groups. Doesn’t seem to include white South Africans or North African Arabs.
- https://oed.com/view/Entry/247955
- https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?&year_start=1950&year_end=2019&content=african+american
- https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=african+american
- https://www.nytimes.com/times-insider/2015/04/21/the-term-african-american-appears-earlier-than-thought-reporters-notebook/
- https://www.nytimes.com/1989/01/31/us/african-american-favored-by-many-of-america-s-blacks.html