The Harlem Renaissance: A History
The Harlem Renaissaince was a flowering of art, literature, and music. No one is clear on when the Renaissaince began but it can be placed between 1924 and possibly ending somwhere in 1930. Characterizing the Renassaince was racial pride that came to be represented in the idea of the New Negro who through his intellect, literatture, art and music could challange the pervading stereotypes of the time.
The majority of the participants in this movement were born from a generation whose parants and grandparents had met the injustices of slavery. Many of these people, who would found the great movement, were part of the migration of the negro from the south and many other states that were still controlled by the Jim Crow laws and the ghost of slavery. In the insuing years there would be no particular style that would characterize the Renassaince but a mixture of styles combining European and Pan African perspective.
Arising from the Harlem Renassaince would be a powerful outpour of black intellectualism which was at the very crux of finding its own voice in the intellectual wilderness. For the black intellectual, this was not simply an act or a united front centerned on intellectualism , but a culture coming to terms with its past and willing to face a future of potential. In truth the Harlem Renassaince was an act of faith in a culture that was just beginning to realize how much beauty was captured in its culture, history and soul. According to essayist and poet, Langston Hughes, “Creative blacks intend to express our individual dark-skinned bodies without shame or fear.” Black intellectuals during this movement were making a political statement to the world, they were also dispalaying the great power and unity that had always been buried within the race and was at last free to be exhibited.
The Harlem Renassaince displayed writers, poets and actors, philosophers and great thinkers who did not seek to put the past behind them but to embrace the spirit that gave their ancestors the strength to endure centuries of oppression; this was not displayed as bitterness and hatred but as a gift for survivial and strength in the face of great odds.
Through music the acceptance of bondage and triumph over hard times was celebrated through songs of faith and hope. This act was demonstrated in a concet, performed by the great and gifted singer and spiritualist, Paul Robeson. His gift of musical vocals and song stirred the hearts of not only those blacks who were able to hear him but also white artists, poets and thinkers who applauded Robeson and all of his songs. And it was in music that the Renassaince would also aid in breaking the black stereotype when white musicians would break old stereotypes by playing music with the best black musicians that Harlem had to offer.
The Harlem Renassaince in its birth would produce such patrons such as Max Eastman, W.E.B Dubois, Alain Locke and Jessie Redmon Fauset. It produced poets and writers such as : Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Jean Toomer and Walter White.
Harlem would also create its own establishments that would put its art and talent on display, The infamous Cotton Club, the Apollo Theater, Connie’s Inn and Small’s Paradise were just a few of the popluar forums for entertainment for both blacks and whites alike.
And while the Harlem Renassaince was primarily an African American movement, one that encouraged an interpersonal suppoert system, publications and organizations, it was aided by many white americans who genuinely wanted to help African Americans gain a voice in the country that would eventually reach beyond Harlem. It was because of this aid that a great deal of prejudices where challanged, faced and eventually overcome.
The Harlem Renassaince would eventually open doors for writers such as James Baldwin who would eventually become a great writer and Civil Rights activist.
Together, the African Americans of the Harlem Renassaince were able to created a whole new medium of art and thought from scratch. They were able to find unity, strength and pride imbued in the slave and bring it to light in their contemporary culture. They took what was considered the greatest shame of the past and shaped it into the foundation of a form of expression for the present. Expression through music, the stage, through prose and literature combined to give face to a once down trodden people. The founders of the Harlem Renassaince were not only intellectuals but visionaries, visionaries that were able to pave the way not just for their generation but for future generations as well.
