Harlem Renaissance Research Paper

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The Harlem renaissance reins from the 1920s to the onset of the depression. It embraces more than just literature; it was also a race-building, image-building and racial integration that generate a generation of black writers and artist (Watson Steven, 1995). It uses art and literature to dignify the image of the black race. Some of the themes of that animated the movement was African as a source of race pride, racial political propaganda and the black folk traditions. The black writers and artist mission was to define their selfhood, create identities as “writers” and as “negro writers” (Watson Steven, 1995). The Harlem Renaissance was the time when cultural, artistic and social associations between African-Americans flourished in Harlem,…show more content…
E. B. Du Bois was known as the towering Negro intellectual of the early twentieth century. He was a social scientist and a political leader who founded the crisis magazine. The magazine paves the way for the renaissance. It was through Du Bois that many future renaissance writers first heard their race described with dignity. His fiery poems set the intellectual standards for the rising generation (Harlem Renaissance, pg. 17-19). One of his finest works was a collection of essays that diagnosed the plight of black people in America called “the Souls of Black Folks”. He believes Art should be earnest and beautiful and above all didactic, to convey and teach the morals of the black race (Harlem Renaissance, pg. 17-19). Du Bois main focus was to build the African-American race from it stereotypical image that the whites have to a more intellectual one. He counted art to be an essential race-building tool for the African-Americans. He tried to achieve that through the works of literature and fine art. He aspires for the black race to develop their own institutions, write about their own experiences and embraces the pan African that encourages the unity to a more social, political and educational standards (Harlem Renaissance, pg.…show more content…
He resisted propagandizing race of the African-American during the Harlem Renaissance. He wrote about the African-American lifestyle exactly as it is in Harlem. His poems where greatly influence by the rhythms of Blues and Jazz (Harlem Renaissance, pg. 49-56). He used his artistry to reflect back to the people. He used his poetry in a way to illustrate that 'there is no lack of beauty, strength and power within the Negro people. He chose so with his poems (poetryfoundation.org). His poem, “The weary Blues” represented the formal rhythms of poetry to the indigenous black ideas of the Blues (Harlem Renaissance, pg. 49-56). Hughes work was highly criticizes by majority of black, but was highly loved by white scholars. Nevertheless, Hughes, more than any of the other black poets or writers during the Harlem renaissance, recorded faithfully the nuances of black life and its frustrations in America. Although Hughes had trouble with both black and white critics, he was the first black American to earn a living solely from his writing and public lectures. Part of the reason is that, he was widely accepted and some of the love he had received from average black people

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