Writing Assignment #2 Historians, political scientists and anthropologists have played a major role in the field of African American studies. There are several similarities and differences when comparing the methodology of all these people. To begin, history has been the most responsible for the restoration of the African past than any other discipline. The methodology of a historian is that of data collection. This can consist of using primary or secondary sources such as government documents, diaries, memoirs, books etc. Where a historian differs from the other fields is that they are completely objective and aim for the systematic understanding of Africa They provide the foundation for other areas to use and obtain a more comprehensive understanding. Continuing, anthropology is the study of culture and began studying Africa before history did. Early anthropologists researched in collaboration with colonial administrators who visited and interviewed Africans about their customs in their free time and created monographs. They have contributed greatly to the field of African American studies, in fact more than eight presidents of the African Studies Association have been anthropologists. Lastly, political science is the study of government and the decision-making process. They were the last to enter into the field of African American Studies due to the development of society and government. African leaders invited many political scientists as advisors and professors. Much like the methods of anthropology they gathered their information first hand. However unlike the other two fields they studied the people of the Africa and how the government influenced what was going on. To conclude, all of these fields have been criticized for the distortion of African realities in order to fit a personal and theoretical framework. All of these fields also use one