ABSTRACT
This chapter identifies the distinctive elements of African American political culture, and the distinctive roles played by the church, informal groups, and events in the political socialization process. The political culture or subculture of African Americans is characterized by a relatively high degree of racial group consciousness and relatively low levels of trust in the government, although this level of trust varies with the responsiveness of the system. The first attribute of the black culture is the idea of the black community itself; a black community, based on shared history and memory, and includes persons of African descent of all classes, ethnicities, and regions. The collective memory within the black community allows the agents of socialization to not only transmit recent events such as black presidential campaigns or other contemporary political events but to integrate them with the past in order to transmit enduring beliefs and values.
