Harlem Renaissance

Art, music, poetry 1917-1930s

1865-1877 Reconstruction 1870s: voting restrictions segregated facilities 1896: Plessy vs. Ferguson Reconstruction ends. Jim Crow laws.

The Great Migration 1 and 2

The Atlanta Compromise Booker T. Washington 1895, The Tuskegee Institute No voting, no protesting, no demands basic education, vocational training

W.E.B. DuBois 1868-1963 Niagara Movement The Souls of Black Folk

Langston Hughes “The critic Donald B. Gibson noted in the introduction to Modern Black Poets: A Collection of Critical Essays (Prentice Hall, 1973) that Hughes “differed from most of his predecessors among black poets . . . in that he addressed his poetry to the people, specifically to black people. During the twenties when most American poets were turning inward, writing obscure and esoteric poetry to an ever decreasing audience of readers, Hughes was turning outward,using language and themes, attitudes and ideas familiar to anyone who had the ability simply to read . . . Until the time of his death, he spread his message humorously—though always seriously—to audiences throughout the country, having read his poetry to more people (possibly) than any other American poet.””

Countee Cullen 1903-1946 Harvard “As heretical as it may sound, there is the probably that Negro poets, dependent as they are on the English language, may have more to gain from the rich background of English and American poetry than from any nebulous atavistic yearnings toward an African inheritance.”

Zora Neale Hurston famous as a storyteller, for her wit, charm and intellect pushes back against “racial uplift.” Disagrees with Hughes on this point. Their Eyes Were Watching God, 1937. Publishes into the void of The Great Depression