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Do Now #2 - The Harlem Renaissance
Originally called the New Negro Movement, the Harlem Renaissance was a literary and intellectual flowering that fostered a new black cultural identity in the 1920s and 1930s. With racism still rampant and economic opportunities scarce, creative expression was one of the few avenues available to African Americans in the early twentieth century.
Perfect Timing:The years between World War I and the Great Depression were boom times for the United States, and jobs were plentiful in cities, especially in the North. Between 1920 and 1930, almost 750,000 African Americans left the South, and many of them migrated to urban areas in the North to take advantage of the prosperity—and the more racially tolerant environment. The Harlem section of Manhattan, which covers just 3 sq mi, drew nearly 175,000 African Americans, turning the neighborhood into the largest concentration of black people in the world.
The orig. manuscript
of Hughes's
Ballad of Booker T.
Langston Hughes, Man of the People: Langston Hughes was one of the most important writers and thinkers of the Harlem Renaissance. Hughes's creative genius was influenced by his life in New York City's Harlem, a primarily African American neighborhood. His literary works helped shape American literature and politics. Hughes, like others active in the Harlem Renaissance, had a strong sense of racial pride. Through his poetry, novels, plays, essays, and children's books, he promoted equality, condemned racism and injustice, and celebrated African American culture, humor, and spirituality. Despite his own very liberal beliefs, Hughes defended African American activists who held more conservative views. For example, in the 1941 poem "Ballad of Booker T.," Hughes defends Booker T. Washington, a former slave and more conservative advocate for equality. Rather than criticize him, the poet focused on Washington's strategy to gain racial equality:
(Remember:Booker T. Washingtonwas a former slave who founded the Tuskegee Institute and became a well-regarded educational leader. Washington was often criticized, however, for his emphasis on vocational education--preparation for skilled manual jobs--rather than academics.)
1. How big was Harlem and how many people lived there? ______
2. What was the “Harlem Renaissance?” ______
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3. Who was Langston Hughes and what is the title of the poem excerpt to the left?______
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4. Langston Hughes' central purpose in writing was, in his own words, "to explain and illuminate the Negro condition in America." How might this excerpt of a poem show that?What year is “85? ______
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5. In this poem, written in 1941, Hughes takes on Washington's critics and explained Washington's position by saying he had to "compromise." How does he explain and justify Washington's work? ______
Practice, practice, practice.
1. The Harlem Renaissance refers to
A. the movement of African-American artists, poets, and writers who expressed theirpride in being black.
B. the "Lost Generation" of writers who moved to Europe during the 1920s.
C. the most famous jazz ensemble during the 1920s.
D. the name of the United Negro Improvement Association’s "Back-To-Africa" movement.
2. The information above is describing what major change in the 1920’s culture in America?
a. The Harlem Renaissance
b. The Jazz Age
c. The Golden Age of Sports
d. The Age of Republicanism