Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- PART I AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE FROM ITS ORIGINS TO THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
- PART II AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
- 12 Foundations of African American modernism, 1910–1950
- 13 The New Negro Movement and the politics of art
- 14 African American literature and the Great Depression
- 15 Weaving jagged words: the black Left, 1930s–1940s
- 16 Writing the American story, 1945–1952
- 17 Geographies of the modern: writing beyond borders and boundaries
- 18 African American literature by writers of Caribbean descent
- 19 Reform and revolution, 1965–1976: the Black Aesthetic at work
- 20 History as fact and fiction
- 21 Redefining the art of poetry
- 22 Cultural resistance and avant-garde aesthetics: African American poetry from 1970 to the present
- 23 New frontiers, cross-currents and convergences: emerging cultural paradigms
- PART III AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE AS ACADEMIC AND CULTURAL CAPITAL
- Bibliography
- Index
- References
13 - The New Negro Movement and the politics of art
from PART II - AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 May 2011
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- PART I AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE FROM ITS ORIGINS TO THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
- PART II AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
- 12 Foundations of African American modernism, 1910–1950
- 13 The New Negro Movement and the politics of art
- 14 African American literature and the Great Depression
- 15 Weaving jagged words: the black Left, 1930s–1940s
- 16 Writing the American story, 1945–1952
- 17 Geographies of the modern: writing beyond borders and boundaries
- 18 African American literature by writers of Caribbean descent
- 19 Reform and revolution, 1965–1976: the Black Aesthetic at work
- 20 History as fact and fiction
- 21 Redefining the art of poetry
- 22 Cultural resistance and avant-garde aesthetics: African American poetry from 1970 to the present
- 23 New frontiers, cross-currents and convergences: emerging cultural paradigms
- PART III AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE AS ACADEMIC AND CULTURAL CAPITAL
- Bibliography
- Index
- References
Summary
“It was the period when the Negro was in vogue,” writes Langston Hughes in his 1940 autobiography The Big Sea about the period commonly known as the New Negro Movement or Harlem Renaissance. In this sentence, Hughes captures two key characteristics of the New Negro Movement. First, it was a period during which blackness, writ large – “The Negro” – even more than black art per se, was in fashion. In addition, the word “vogue” in this sentence is instructive. Hughes reminds us that fads are temporary, and every vogue must die; identities perish, too. New ones are born, of course, and the New Negro Movement was as much concerned with the creation of a fresh African American identity as it was with the demise of the old. “Progress” was the watchword of this movement, but every step forward demanded a look behind. More than progress, the theme of the New Negro Movement is contradiction.
In historical terms, the enormous step forward represented by the New Negro Movement cannot be overstated. The Harlem Renaissance was occasioned by the Great Migration. At the turn of the twentieth century, African Americans found themselves grappling with a host of factors that were pushing them out of the South and pulling them toward the North. The “push” factors in the South included an increasing degree of racist violence and repression; natural disasters (both a boll-weevil infestation and a drought); and a lack of viable job opportunities.
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- The Cambridge History of African American Literature , pp. 268 - 287Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2011