The 1920s saw a boom in the recognition and popularity of black literature, music, theater, and art known as the Harlem Renaissance. The Harlem Renaissance, also known as the New Negro Movement based on an anthology by Alain Locke in 1925, occurred after the Great Migration of African Americans from the South to northern cities such as Philadelphia, Chicago, and New York. During World War I, European immigrants essentially ceased immigration into the United States, but the war created thousands of unskilled laboring positions for northern war-producing factories. This led African Americans to embark on a “Great Migration” to the northern cities to fill these laboring positions. They established communities in the northern cities, most famously Harlem, from which the name of the Renaissance was derived. And many of the African Americans who moved to these northern black communities were skilled writers and artists.
These talented African Americans became the face of the “New Negro,” a post-World War I and post-Great Migration African American who was assertive, self-confident, and proud of his heritage, even in the face of horrible racial and social segregation exacerbated by the Jim Crow Laws. The New Negro movement insisted on self-definition, and self-determination, self-expression, hope, and pride in heritage, striving for what Locke called "spiritual emancipation." They did this most popularly through literature, art, theater, and music. The 1920s are not often referred to as the Jazz Age for no reason; during this time period, African Americans combined traditional brass jazz music with the rich man’s piano, creating a music that was lively, upbeat, passionate, and a perfect reflection of African American pride and expression despite hardships during this time. African American bluegrass and soul music also became popular at this time. Even white Americans could not resist the African Americans’ music; they incorporated it in their compositions, concerts, and pop-culture music. It was an excellent time for black artists, most notably Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Willie "The Lion" Smith, and Louis Armstrong. They represented African American pride and individuality in this changing time. Literature was another fantastic avenue for African American self-expression in the 1920s. The first “New Negro” newspaper, founded by Hubert Harrison, The Voice, began in this time period, as well as the African-American culture magazine The Crisis, the journal of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and Opportunity, the publication of the National Urban League. Most notable from this time period, however, is the poetry of incredibly talented black authors such as Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Jessie Fauset, Claude McKay, and Zora Neale Hurston. They showed the individuality and aesthetic of the African American race and spoke for better treatment of their people through their literature, which was read by people of all races throughout the United States. Overall, the Harlem Renaissance was a flowering of African American culture that helped advance the political demands of African Americans for racial and social equality. It represented a new sociological development of racial consciousness that laid the foundation for the Civil Rights Movement post-World War II and inspired people to become civil rights activists during this time period. Boundless. “The Harlem Renaissance.” Boundless U.S. History Boundless, 05 Dec. 2016. Retrieved 13 Jan. 2017 from https://www.boundless.com/u-s-history/textbooks/boundless-u-s-history-textbook/the-roaring-twenties-1920-1929-24/a-culture-of-change-187/the-harlem-renaissance-1040-9731
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