The Harlem Renaissance

Originally known as "The New Negro Movement," what became known as The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural trend in the 1920's and 1930's, centered in Harlem. Music played a huge role (including people like Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Jelly Roll Morton, and Willie "The Lion" Smith), but the Renaissance included drama (Zora Neale Hurston) poets (Langston Hughes), intellectuals (W.E.B. Du Bois), artists (Charles Alston), and a number of other elements, too. Places like the Cotton Club became hubs for the movement, where people would dance, party, and mingle.

The movement was criticized, contemporaneously and in the years since, for a number of reasons. The Renaissance claimed to be attempting to develop an entirely African American culture, that was unique from that of the White dominated culture that was present at the time. Critics point out that much of the art and ideas parallels that of White culture, and that by adopting certain white elements, they were not accomplishing this goal. Furthermore, the culture itself was appealing to those of all ethnicities, again counter to some of the intents of the movement. While these criticisms may be founded in truth, the Renaissance itself created a number of amazing pieces of art, music, and writing, which went on to influence generations afterward. More importantly, this movement brought into American consciousness the identity of the modern African American as part of our own American Heritage. By reversing the then-stereotype of the "rural and ignorant black," the Renaissance helped paved the rocky road toward the Civil Rights Movement in the years to come.