The Harlem Renaissance
Jessica McBirney
The Harlem Renaissance was an artistic and cultural explosion among African Americans living in Harlem, New York in the 1920s. It produced some of the greatest American artists, musicians, and writers of all time, and expanded the identity and culture of a group that had been marginalized for hundreds of years.
Why Harlem?
After the Civil War ended and slavery was abolished in 1865, many African Americans remained in southern states where their families had once been slaves on plantations. Most found jobs as farm laborers – doing essentially the same work they had done as slaves, but now for a meager wage. Over the next few decades, even though the federal government made some attempts to give African Americans a decent life, segregation, as well as racist attitudes and racial violence, kept freed slaves and their families from improving their own circumstances. The governments of southern states often ignored the hardships faced by African Americans.
In the early 1900s, African Americans began moving north where they could find better-paid jobs working in city factories instead of on farms. This movement was known as The Great Migration. Neighborhoods that were mostly black popped up in cities all over the North, including Harlem, a neighborhood in New York City. It was originally built for a white, upper-middle-class population, but in 1910 a group of African American realtors purchased several blocks in the area and opened the neighborhood to the new black migrants from the south. Not only did African Americans settle there, but dark-skinned immigrants from the Caribbean also came to seek a better life. These immigrants, often former slaves as well, also faced discrimination and oppression in their home countries.
Art Confronting Racism
Even though the north did not have as much overt and institutionalized racism as the south, African Americans still faced some level of discrimination and encountered stereotypes about their people and culture. One of the most common stereotypes was that they were primitive, wild people still closely connected to the "jungle roots" of their origins in Africa.
The first major cultural event of the Harlem Renaissance, a 1917 theater production called "Three Plays for a Negro Theater," tore down these stereotypes for its viewers. It was written by the white playwright Ridgely Torrence and cast African Americans to portray complex human events and emotions. Two years later poet Claude McKay published the sonnet "If We Must Die." Although the poem never addressed race directly, African-American readers found its message of defiance inspiring as they continued to hear about racially motivated violence around the country. Literature in the Harlem Renaissance portrayed African Americans as complex human beings with intelligence and emotions, just like any other person. It provided insight into the everyday life of African Americans. These ideas were revolutionary for many white spectators because they countered the typical, stereotypical depictions of African Americans in popular culture.
The Harlem Renaissance did not promote a specific political viewpoint or artistic style. Rather, it was a chance for a variety of African American artists to use their own form of art to express racial pride and identity. Artists held the belief that through intellect, literature, art, and music, their work could challenge racism and enable African Americans to better integrate into American society as a whole.
Literature and Music
Literature dominated the Harlem Renaissance and was one of the most powerful tools African Americans used to develop their own culture. The most famous writer to emerge from the period was Langston Hughes, a poet who decided to ignore many of the conventional rules for poetry in favor of a more rhythmic approach, drawn from traditional and new African American music like spirituals and the blues. He wrote about the many struggles African Americans faced, but a theme of hope and overcoming hardship ran through many of his books.
Writers at the time popularized the concept of the "New Negro." This was an identity they hoped all African Americans would embrace, one of assertiveness and a refusal to submit to the old racial prejudice and segregation that had plagued them for so long.
Music became another central component in Harlem. As jazz continued to grow in popularity everywhere during the 1920s, musicians in Harlem put their own spin on the music: the Harlem Stride Style. They added piano to the brass instruments of jazz. Many famous jazz musicians rose to stardom during this period, including Duke Ellington. Music in Harlem also included elements from old black spiritual songs and the blues. White artists began to take notice of black musicians, and they incorporated some of this new culture into their own music.
A Deep and Lasting Impact
Not only did the Harlem Renaissance produce new and exciting art and music, it also helped to define a new part of the African American identity. Since African Americans had been enslaved and oppressed for so long, it was important to create a cultural heritage of which they could be proud. It also made the larger American culture take African-Americans more seriously, and it laid important groundwork for the Civil Rights movement that would come several decades later
Why Harlem?
After the Civil War ended and slavery was abolished in 1865, many African Americans remained in southern states where their families had once been slaves on plantations. Most found jobs as farm laborers – doing essentially the same work they had done as slaves, but now for a meager wage. Over the next few decades, even though the federal government made some attempts to give African Americans a decent life, segregation, as well as racist attitudes and racial violence, kept freed slaves and their families from improving their own circumstances. The governments of southern states often ignored the hardships faced by African Americans.
In the early 1900s, African Americans began moving north where they could find better-paid jobs working in city factories instead of on farms. This movement was known as The Great Migration. Neighborhoods that were mostly black popped up in cities all over the North, including Harlem, a neighborhood in New York City. It was originally built for a white, upper-middle-class population, but in 1910 a group of African American realtors purchased several blocks in the area and opened the neighborhood to the new black migrants from the south. Not only did African Americans settle there, but dark-skinned immigrants from the Caribbean also came to seek a better life. These immigrants, often former slaves as well, also faced discrimination and oppression in their home countries.
Art Confronting Racism
Even though the north did not have as much overt and institutionalized racism as the south, African Americans still faced some level of discrimination and encountered stereotypes about their people and culture. One of the most common stereotypes was that they were primitive, wild people still closely connected to the "jungle roots" of their origins in Africa.
The first major cultural event of the Harlem Renaissance, a 1917 theater production called "Three Plays for a Negro Theater," tore down these stereotypes for its viewers. It was written by the white playwright Ridgely Torrence and cast African Americans to portray complex human events and emotions. Two years later poet Claude McKay published the sonnet "If We Must Die." Although the poem never addressed race directly, African-American readers found its message of defiance inspiring as they continued to hear about racially motivated violence around the country. Literature in the Harlem Renaissance portrayed African Americans as complex human beings with intelligence and emotions, just like any other person. It provided insight into the everyday life of African Americans. These ideas were revolutionary for many white spectators because they countered the typical, stereotypical depictions of African Americans in popular culture.
The Harlem Renaissance did not promote a specific political viewpoint or artistic style. Rather, it was a chance for a variety of African American artists to use their own form of art to express racial pride and identity. Artists held the belief that through intellect, literature, art, and music, their work could challenge racism and enable African Americans to better integrate into American society as a whole.
Literature and Music
Literature dominated the Harlem Renaissance and was one of the most powerful tools African Americans used to develop their own culture. The most famous writer to emerge from the period was Langston Hughes, a poet who decided to ignore many of the conventional rules for poetry in favor of a more rhythmic approach, drawn from traditional and new African American music like spirituals and the blues. He wrote about the many struggles African Americans faced, but a theme of hope and overcoming hardship ran through many of his books.
Writers at the time popularized the concept of the "New Negro." This was an identity they hoped all African Americans would embrace, one of assertiveness and a refusal to submit to the old racial prejudice and segregation that had plagued them for so long.
Music became another central component in Harlem. As jazz continued to grow in popularity everywhere during the 1920s, musicians in Harlem put their own spin on the music: the Harlem Stride Style. They added piano to the brass instruments of jazz. Many famous jazz musicians rose to stardom during this period, including Duke Ellington. Music in Harlem also included elements from old black spiritual songs and the blues. White artists began to take notice of black musicians, and they incorporated some of this new culture into their own music.
A Deep and Lasting Impact
Not only did the Harlem Renaissance produce new and exciting art and music, it also helped to define a new part of the African American identity. Since African Americans had been enslaved and oppressed for so long, it was important to create a cultural heritage of which they could be proud. It also made the larger American culture take African-Americans more seriously, and it laid important groundwork for the Civil Rights movement that would come several decades later