Harlem Renaissance + Peters: May 2008

Elements of The Harlem Renaissance

The Harlem Renaissance is the time period from the end of WWI all the way through the Depression that began in Harlem, New York. This period was a literary, artistic, cultural, and intellectual movement during which a number of gifted African-American raised issues in an assortment of shapes including literature, art, music, drama, painting, sculpture, movies, and protests. The Harlem Renaissance represented freedom for the artists; the freedom to use their gifts in a way that allowed them to voice their opinions towards topics that were once taboo. Once the movement gained momentum, it moved from Harlem to the rest of the country and then beyond the border to the world.

Elements of The Civil Rights Movement

The Civil Rights Movement in the United States was a political, legal, and social struggle by African Americans to gain full citizen rights and to achieve racial equality. During the civil rights movement, individuals and civil rights organizations challenged segregation and discrimination with an assortment of activities, including protest marches, boycotts, and the refusal to abide by segregation laws. Many believe the movement began with the Montgomery bus boycott in 1955 and ended with the Voting Rights Act of 1965. This time period represented actual physical independence from slavery and discrimination that African Americans had struggled to achieve since the Harlem Renaissance.

How were the two periods different? Similar?

The Harlem Renaissance and the Civil Rights Movement were similar in that both periods were searching for freedom. The Harlem Renaissance was more about African Americans challenging white superiority and racism, and instead celebrating black dignity and creativity, and the black culture that had emerged out of slavery and their cultural ties to Africa. The Civil Rights Movement was a time in which noted events and reform movements aimed at abolishing public and private acts of racial discrimination and racism against African Americans. The two time periods are different in the level, and the extent at which they went to; the Harlem Renaissance wasn't quite as dangerous as the Civil Rights Movement, and wasn't about such controversial issues.

Billie Holiday - Harlem Renaissance Musician

Strange Fruit - This song condemned racism, particularly the lynching of African Americans that had occurred for decades before this was written. It was also included in the list of Songs of the Century, by the Recording Industry of America and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Strange Fruit" began as a poem written by Abel Meerpol, a Jewish high-school teacher from the Bronx, about the lynching of two black men. The "strange fruit" referred to in the song are the bodies of African American men hanged during a lynching. The song ultimately became the anthem of the anti-lynching movement.

Strange Fruit - Lewis Allan (Lyrics)
Southern trees bear a strange fruit,Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze,Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.
Pastoral scene of the gallant South,The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,Then the sudden smell of burning flesh!
Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck,For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,Here is a strange and bitter crop.

This piece embodies the time period of the Harlem Renaissance because it let Billie Holiday express her feelings toward racism through an analogy that many people did not even understand.

Zora Neale Hurston - Female Writer of the Harlem Renaissance

Zora Neale Hurston wrote "Their Eyes Were Watching God," a novel set in Southern Florida in the early 1900's. This novel is about a proud, independent black woman who goes through three marriages in the hopes of finding real love. "Their Eyes Were Watching God" has become the most widely read and highly acclaimed novel in the canon of African-American literature. This work embodies the Harlem Renaissance because in it Janie is trying to live up to all of her dreams and desires, and isn't letting her race or her gender get in the way.

"What she doin coming back here in dem overhalls? Can't she find no dress to put on? -- Where's dat blue satin dress she left here in? -- Where all dat money her husband took and died and left her? -- What dat ole forty year ole 'oman doin' wid her hair swingin' down her back lak some young gal? Where she left dat young lad of a boy she went off here wid? -- Thought she was going to marry? -- Where he left her? -- What he done wid all her money? -- Betcha he off wid some gal so young she ain't even got no hairs -- why she don't stay in her class?" - Chapter 1

Sterling A Brown - Male Writer fromt the Harlem Renaissance

In 1933 Brown published his first book of poetry Southern Road. Southern Road was a collection of poetry with rural themes and treated the simple lives of poor, black, country folk with poignancy and pride. It used authentic dialect and structures.

Swing dat hammer--hunh--
Steady, bo';
Swing dat hammer--hunh--
Steady, bo';
Ain't no rush, bebby,
Long ways to go.
Burner tore his--hunh--
Black heart away;
Burner tore his--hunh--
Black heart away;
Got me life, bebby,
An' a day.
Gal's on Fifth Street--hunh--
Son done gone;
Gal's on Fifth Street--hunh--
Son done gone;
Wife's in de ward, bebby,
Babe's not bo'n.
My ole man died--hunh--
Cussin' me;
My ole man died--hunh--
Cussin' me;
Ole lady rocks, bebby,
Huh misery.
Doubleshackled--hunh--
Guard behin';
Doubleshackled--hunh--
Guard behin';
Ball an' chain, bebby,
On my min'.
White man tells me--hunh--
Damn yo' soul;
White man tells me--hunh--
Damn yo' soul;
Got no need, bebby,
To be tole.
Chain gang nevah--hunh--
Let me go;
Chain gang nevah--hunh--
Let me go;
Po' los' boy, bebby,
Evahmo' . . .

This piece embodies the Harlem Renaissance because in it Sterling A. Brown shows the reader how he is being treated, and lets the reader see into his life.

Aaron Douglas - Artist of the Harlem Renaissance

Aaron Douglas was the Harlem Renaissance artist whose work best exemplified the 'New Negro' philosophy. He painted murals for public buildings and produced illustrations and cover designs for many black publications.

The four-panel series Aspects of Negro Life tracks the journey of African Americans from freedom in Africa to enslavement in the United States and from liberation after the Civil War to life in the modern city. In this study for the first panel, a man and woman in Africa dance to the beat of drums as concentric circles of light emphasize the heat and rhythm of their movements. A sculpture floating in a central circle above the dancers' heads suggests the importance of spirits in African culture.

Lorraine Hansberry - Writer of the Civil Rights Movement

Lorriane Hansberry's work, "A Raisin in the Sun," is based upon her family's own experiences growing up in Chicago. A Raisin in the Sun was the first play written by a black woman to be produced on Broadway. The play is about a family dreaming of leaving behind the apartment where they have lived since being married. The house that the family dreams of buying is in an all white neighborhood. Their racist future neighbors send one of their members to try to buy them out and prevent the neighborhood's integration. The man initially contemplates taking the money, but ultimately refuses to be intimidated. This play embodies the Civil Rights Movement because it shows the prejudices that people felt toward African Americans, and in the end, showed the African Americans getting their dream come true.

Pete Seeger - Musician of the Civil Rights

Pete Seeger is a folk singer, political activist, and a key figure in the mid-20th century American folk music revival. Pete emerged on the public scene as a pioneer of protest music in the late 1950s and the 1960s. Seeger is widely credited with popularizing the traditional song "We Shall Overcome," which became the publicly perceived anthem of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement. This song embodies the Civil Rights Movement because it demands freedom as a united group, something that the Civil Rights Movement demanded as well.

We shall overcome, we shall overcomeWe shall overcome somedayOh deep in my heart, I do believeThat we shall overcome somedayWe'll walk hand in hand, we'll walk hand in handWe'll walk hand in hand somedayOh deep in my heart, I do believeThat we shall overcome somedayWe shall live in peace, we shall live in peaceWe shall live in peace somedayOh deep in my heart, I do believeThat we shall overcome somedayWe shall brothers be, we shall brothers beWe shall brothers be somedayOh deep in my heart, I do believeThat we shall overcome somedayThe truth shall make us free, truth shall make us freeThe truth shall make us free somedayOh deep in my heart, I do believeThat we shall overcome somedayWe are not afraid, we are not afraidWe are not afraid todayOh deep in my heart, I do believeThat we shall overcome someday

Harlem Renaissance + Peters

Elements of The Harlem Renaissance

Jammin' at the Savoy - Romare Bearden

Elements of The Civil Rights Movement

Images of Labor - Striker

Monday, May 26, 2008

Billie Holiday - Strange Fruit