Harlem Renaissance!1920’s to 1930’s

By: Mark Cook

Words from the best . . . "...Our problem is to conceive,

develop, establish an art era. Not white art painting black...let's bare our arms and plunge them deep through laughter, through pain, through sorrow, through hope, through disappointment, into the very depths of the souls of our people and drag forth material crude, rough, neglected. Then let's sing it, dance it, write it, paint it. Let's do the impossible. Let's create something transcendentally material, mystically objective, Earthy, Spiritually earthy. Just Dynamic." - Aaron Douglas

Beginning• After World War I, a cultural awakening and a new Black

identity emerged from an artistic era in centered in the heart New York. This era was called the Harlem Renaissance developed from Harlem. The Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 1930s was the beginning of an “acceptance” of the Black artist, writer and poets in White America. The mass movement of blacks to major cities in the East was called the Great Migration. Even though it persisted less than 20 years, it made a significant impact in America, that is still with us today.

ORIGIN• The Harlem Renaissance was an era that grew solely, out of the changes that had

taken place in the African American community since the end of slavery. Until the end of the Civil War, the majority of African Americans had been enslaved and lived in the South, where industrialization was attracting tons of people to cities from rural areas and gave a rise to a fresh culture. Most of the African-American literary movement arose from a generation that had lived through the gains and losses of Reconstruction after the Civil War. The Harlem Renaissance was directly the result of the Great Migration out of the South and into the big cities of the North and Midwest. Due to the fact that African Americans sought a better standard of living and relief from the detrimental racism in the South.

• Uniting most of them was their convergence in Harlem, New York City. Like most people know, as soon as slavery ended, blacks began to strive for equality in social life, politics, and all aspects of life.

Jean Toomer - (December 26, 1894 – March 30, 1967) was an American poet and novelist and an important figure of the Harlem Renaissance. His first book Cane is considered by many as his most significant. He also was elected into the Georgia Hall of Fame in 2002.Louis Armstrong - (August 4, 1901 – July 6, 1971) nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an

American jazz trumpeter and singer from New Orleans, Louisiana, who was considered the greatest of all Jazz musicians.

Marcus Garvey - (August 17, 1887 – June 10, 1940) was a Jamaican entrepreneur, orator, journalist, and publisher, who was a loyal leader of the Black Nationalism and Pan-

Africanism movements. Which he actually founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA-ACL).

James Weldon - (June 17, 1871 – June 26, 1938) was an American diplomat, politician, author, anthologist, critic, lawyer, journalist, poet, educator, songwriter, and early civil rights

activist. Remembered most for his leadership in the NAACP. He was also one of the first African-American professors.

Claude McKay - (September 15, 1889 – May 22, 1948) was a Jamaican-American poet and writer and is best known for his three very famous novels. 1) Home to Harlem (1928), a best-

seller which won the Harmon Gold Award for Literature, 2) Banjo (1929), and 3) Banana Bottom (1933).

MEMORABLE FIGURES

Aaron Douglas - (May 26, 1899 – February 3, 1979) was an African American painter and a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance, who also founded the Art

Department at Fisk University and taught for 27 years.James L. Allen - (November 21, 1904 – January 18, 1992) was one of the founders

of management businesses such as Booz Allen Hamilton and Booz & Company.Fats Waller (Thomas Wright Waller) - (May 21, 1904 – December 15, 1943), was an infamous jazz pianist, organist, composer, singer, and comedic entertainer who

excelled at what he did. He was the youngest of four children.Arthur “Art” Tatum - (October 13, 1909 – November 5, 1956) was a brilliant

American jazz pianist, who is widely compared to Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder due in part to his partial blindness. He is also widely recognized as one of the

greatest jazz pianists of all time.Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington - (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974) was an

extremely prominent composer, pianist, and big band leader of jazz. He wrote over 1,500 compositions in jazz music. It’s been argues that there hasn’t been a greater

composer since him.

MEMORABLE FIGURES, PART. 2

Long-Term Impact

• The Harlem Renaissance will be forever remembered as the era that changed not only African American culture, but American culture in general. Americans overall became more accepting of the Black voice in literature, music, art and society.

Religion• The Harlem Renaissance was arguably the most significant

when it came to encouraging the thinking patterns and impeccable creativity, related to “religious and philosophical ideals” (Cradle). It inspired religion in many ways to flourish and prosper into many different natures and ways during this time. During the 1920's -30's, different types of Christianity/Catholic churches were formed. In 1920, the African American Pentecostal (a movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through the baptism in the Holy Spirit) was made. This new run through offered a new experience in relation to the prior traditions practiced by majority of African Americans. In 1921, Marcus Garvey organized the African Orthodox Church which is similar to Orthodox Christianity in Africa.

Religion, pt. 2• Charles A. Tiney was the first African American to write and

publish church hymns. The style of the hymns ranged from Gospel to Blues, and held tons of expression concerning religion and faith. Most people across the Harlem Renaissance Era accepted neo-orthodox and traditional Christianity as popular religions to follow. This epidemic resulted in the up and coming projects, like: “mega-type churches; sect/cult approaches; religious nationalists; and highly emotional storefront churches” (Michaels). Ultimately, the Harlem Renaissance directly resulting in upbringing of modern Christianity, Catholicism, and House of God churches.

ART

• In his 1925 essay, "The New Negro", Howard University Professor of Philosophy Alain Locke encouraged African American artists to create a school of African American art with a distinguishable and beautiful style. Also, he wanted them to look to African culture and African American folk life for subject matter and inspiration for then and modern projects affiliated with Black History from the Harlem Renaissance.

ART, PT. 2

• Locke's ideas along with a new ethnic awareness that was happening in urban areas around major cities such as Chicago and Harlem, inspired up and coming African American artists to jump on the bandwagon. These artists “rejected landscapes for the figurative, rural scenes for urban and focused on class, culture and Africa to bring ethnic consciousness into art and create a new black identity” (Douglass and Maverick).

ART, PT. 3• In major cities between 1920-1930 an unprecedented outburst of

creative activity among African-Americans occurred in all fields of art.

Photographic artists “played a key role in creating depictions of the New

Negro” (Michaels). Fortunately, not only artists did major projects like this,

“their counterparts in literature, music, and theater, painters Palmer C.

Hayden, Malvin Gray Johnson, and Laura Wheeler Waring, among others,

exhibited bold, stylized portraits of African Americans during this period, as

well as scenes of black life from a variety of perspectives” (Owens).

PoliticsAside from being the, “center for artistic and religious movements,”

(Owens) Harlem was also a hotbed for “political movements and heated

debates”(Owens). In this portion of history, the Harlem Renaissance

“introduced people to the political leaders, discussions, and major art forms

used today” (Owens). Although, the fight between various races for social and

political justice and equality always had a major impact on US history, this

battle began to rage during the 1920s.

Politics, pt. 2Harlem, New York was considered the, “Ground Zero” during the Harlem Renaissance for

Blacks because they were never freer anywhere else. Malcolm X reminisced in his autobiography,

“In one night, New York-Harlem- had just about narcotized me.” (Malcolm X). However,

throughout the country an atmosphere of institutionalized racism and hatred abounded. Racism

was not only confined to the white community. Many Blacks in Harlem “were under the spell of

the West Indian caste system, which has three groups, white, yellow and black. In-group racism

was common in Harlem and still persists to this day in which Marcus Garvey mentions this system

in many of his writings” (Parks and Jeffries). Since Harlem was as close to heaven as possible as

far as freedom from daily racism goes, the rest of the country (especially the South) was

extraordinarily cruel and violent. 

It’s been debated over time, that the Harlem Renaissance, or the New Negro Movement, was an essential moment in African American literature, due to an exceptional outburst of creativity of most African American authors and writes. Trudier states that, “The importance of this movement of Black literary art lies in the efforts of its writers to exalt the heritage of African Americans and to use their unique culture as a means toward re-defining African American literary expression.” This, in other words simply states that Blacks simply wanted to put their life, heritage, and persevering history on paper for all to read and see.

Harlem Lit

The “Literacy Boom” of the Harlem Renaissance began in “the lower

Manhattan (Greenwich Village) and upper Manhattan (Harlem) sections of New York

City, it gained national force when Charles Spurgeon Johnson, editor of Opportunity,

the official organ of the National Urban League, encouraged aspiring writers to

migrate to New York in order to form a critical mass of young black creative artists”

(Trudier). For more recognition toward their works, African American authors Harlem

Renaissance “produced a sizable body of work, often exploring such themes as

alienation and marginality” (Trudier).

Harlem lit, pt. 2

The majority of the literary works from the time period of the Harlem Renaissance mirrors the

various ways that blacks experienced life in. Many of the well-known poets, authors, and writers were

Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Claude McKay, Helene Johnson, Zora Neale Hurston, Nella Larsen, and

Jean Toomer. From their popular and memorable works “the literature of this period helped to facilitate a

transformation from the psychology of the “Old Negro” (characterized by an implied inferiority of the post-

Reconstruction era when black artists often did not control the means of production or editorial

prerogatives) to the “New Negro” (characterized as self-assertive, racially conscious, articulate, and, for the

most part, in charge of what they produced)” (Trudier). The Book of American Negro Poetry (1922), edited

by James Weldon Johnson and The New Negro (1925) by Locke are popular books from this period.

Harlem lit, pt. 3

Culture

Before the Harlem Renaissance was called that it was known as the “New Negro Movement,” due

to the uprising of African American advancement. The Harlem Renaissance was mainly an African

American cultural movement that reached its height between 1920 and 1937 in a borough of New York

City called Harlem. It was “more than a literary movement and more than a social revolt against racism,

the Harlem Renaissance exalted the unique culture of African-Americans and redefined African-American

expression” (Isaacs). African-Americans began to encourage one another to celebrate their heritage,

inheritance, legacy, and persevering history. Also, they wanted to become "The New Negro, (Olive)" a

term coined in 1925 by sociologist and critic Alain LeRoy Locke. In his influential book The New Negro

(1925), Locke described the southern migration of blacks as "something like a spiritual emancipation.”

(Locke)

More on CultureThis period marked the first time that white Americans gave serious attention to African American

culture. One of the major factors that contributed to the rise of unique culture during the Harlem

Renaissance was the great migration of African-Americans to northern cities (such as New York City,

Chicago, and Washington, D.C.) between 1919 and 1926. This single event, sparked one of the greatest

and most modern influential time period ever. Harlem attracted the most “prosperous and stylish black

middle class from which sprang an extraordinary artistic center.” (Isaacs) Like movements in Europe, it

embraced almost all art-forms, containing music, dance, film, theatre and cabaret. People during this

period also prided themselves on having a good fun time partying, making the modern, “Nightlife,” come

alive. The Harlem Renaissance was more than a literary movement and more than a social revolt against

racism, the Harlem Renaissance “exalted the unique culture of African-Americans and redefined African-

American expression.” (Isaacs)

End of the Era

While many people still debate the exact reasons for this era’s demise, most generally loosely say it lasted through the 1920s through into the mid-1930s. Although other factors came into to play to unravel the movement, most scholars say that the most significant cause of the death of the era was the Great Depression.

Pleasurable Truths

It was more of a literary revolution for the African Americans rather than a social, political, or economic gain.

Occurrence in the city of Harlem, New York during the 1920's and 1930's.

Though centered in Harlem, New York City, USA, the movement impacted urban cities throughout the United States.

Has had an everlasting mark on the nation and the world that can never be erased.

The first time, African Americans in America were able to determine who they are for themselves and their children.

Although blacks were advancing during this time, they were still discriminated against especially in the Great Depression.

The Great Depression caused the Harlem group of writers to scatter; many were forced to leave New York or to take other jobs to tide them over the hard times.

Cotton Club, was a center-piece for the great African-American entertainers, such as Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, Louis Armstrong, and Ethel Waters.