"Utilizing current trends in reading comprehension used in educational classes," this paper discusses "some forms of communication practiced by early black Americans and their implications for innovation in critical thinking and comprehension strategies.""Utilizing an anthropological approach, this work provides an intense and unified description and investigation of the texts of American Negro spirituals." The paper also discusses the treatment of historical, social and psychological phenomena accompanying Negro life under slavery and presents an objective emphasis of the relationship among the varying interpretations of the spirituals. The paper then analyzes the context of religious imagery and the history out of which the spiritual evolved. The paper concludes that the secret messages and coded words in the spirituals communicate the history of a people's attempted rebellions, modes of accommodation, techniques of survival, as well as explicit and implicit means of freedom. Contains a 57-item bibliography of books, articles, dissertations, reports, and audio-visuals. (RS)