Answer to Question #259504 in History for Pat

Question

 

1/ What was meant by the “New Negro” and how can you relate it to both Garveyism and the Harlem Renaissance?

 

 

 

 

 

 

2/ What role did white patrons (Carl Van Vechten, Charlotte Osgood Mason, Cotton Club audiences) play in black cultural production of the 1920s?

 

                                                                                                       

 

 

 

3/Describe some of the conflicts among African American writers and intellectuals (W. E. B. Du Bois, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston) over the role that art should play in racial advancement. 

 

 

 

 

 

4/What was the magazine Fire and what were its creators attempting to do for black culture?

 

 

 

 

 

5/What was the significance of the blues women of the 1920s?

 

 

 

 

6/Why didn’t Richard Wright like Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God?  Do you think her book was political? How/how not?

 

 

 

 

 

7/ Change over time: What connections do you see between the discussions of the 1920s and those of the 1990s as described by document #6 “The United States Congress Investigates Rap Music” (Major Problems ch. 18, 545-50)? In what ways might these comparisons hold up today?

Answer 1

1.     After the Civil War, the "new Negro" was a concept popularized in the second half of the nineteenth century, when African-Americans hoped to represent themselves in new, progressive ways, whether in politics or in culture. There was a shift from the old Negro, or plantation slave, to the new Negro, or African-Americans who were considered more refined, educated, smart, and politically engaged. To many individuals, the Renaissance was a cultural movement in which the high level of black creative and cultural creation demanded and got mainstream attention, where racial solidarity was linked with social development, and where the concept of blackness became a commodity in and of itself. As a result, not just because of current scholarly discussions over its origins, inception, and end, but also because of its essential importance to twentieth-century ideas and society, the New Negro Renaissance is the most widely studied period of African-American literary history. Garvey arrived in America at the start of the militant "New Negro" era. Black anger, sparked by the brutal race riots in East St. Louis in 1917 and fueled by postwar disillusionment, reached new heights in 1919 with the Red Summer of widespread racial unrest. Garvey secretly created a chapter of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), a benevolent fraternal organization, not long after his arrival. Garvey climbed quickly from humble beginnings to become the most well-known, most controversial, and, for many, the most appealing and captivating of a new generation of black leaders.

2.     By taking up New York's African American community and financially supporting young artists and writers, white patrons played a significant influence in black cultural production in the 1920s. In America and around the world, the literature, music, and fashion they created defined culture and "cool" for blacks and whites alike.

3.     Many northern American cities, such as Harlem, had huge numbers of African Americans emboldened by new experiences and better pay, spurred by the prospect of change by the end of the war. Several black intellectuals, including W. E. B. Du Bois and Alain Locke, were stating unequivocally that the moment had come for white America to recognize the accomplishments of African-American artists and philosophers. The belief that if white people were exposed to black people's artistic accomplishments, they would accept them gained popular.

4.     Fire!! was a magazine that used literature as a vehicle of enlightenment to represent the African-American experience during the Harlem Renaissance in a modern and realistic way. The magazine's creators aimed to convey how younger African Americans were shifting their ideas.

5.     The blues women of the 1920s made the music popular in the USA, in fact, because of the racial divide in America, most Americans were unaware of this important part of their musical heritage. In the 1920s country blues emerged from the spiritual songs often heard among the black field workers in the southern states of America

6.     Authors Richard Wright and Zora Neale Hurston's work is frequently viewed as a contrast between political protest (Wright) and a more individualistic, less obviously political approach (Hurston). Richard Wright, who was widely regarded as Hurston's literary adversary, incorrectly criticized her novel for not overtly addressing the "race problem" and for purportedly preferring sensuality to social commentary. I, too, approached the novel with some mistrust.

7.     Discussions from the 1920s and 1990s highlight decades of significant social transformation. The emergence of a consumer-oriented economy and popular entertainment, which contributed to bring about a "revolution in morality and manners," were the most visible symptoms of change. During the period, sexual mores, gender roles, hair styles, and clothing all underwent significant changes. The periods shows us the importance of looking to the past for answers and inspiration while coping with contemporary concerns. We can not only identify potential sources of solutions, but also strategies to overcome present difficulties that prior cultures have experienced, by looking to the past for advice today.