Harlem Renaissance Lives - 9780195387957

Centered in Harlem, New York City, the movement that became known as the Harlem Renaissance sprung up in major black urban centers throughout the United States, the Caribbean, the British West Indies, and Paris. Largely a cultural movement, its influence went well beyond the arts, impacting a great many fields, including sociology, historiography, philosophy, psychology, and even politics, making any study of the Harlem Renaissance a study of the general cultural and social history of black America. Stretching from 1919 through the Great Depression and beyond, the Harlem Renaissance reached its zenith between the years 1924 and 1929, when the stock market crashed. While celebrating black dignity and creativity, African Americans during the Harlem Renaissance explored their identities, focusing their attention on black culture as it emerged out of slavery, as well as their cultural ties to Africa.
This one-volume biographical collection features African Americans who made their names during the Harlem Renaissance. It includes central figures like the poet Langston Hughes, the singer Bessie Coleman, the artist Romare Beardon, the dancer/performer Josephine Baker, and jazzman Louis Armstrong, and the cultural and political giant W. E. B. Du Bois. Also included are biographies of lesser-known or forgotten artists and cultural figures, as well as people like the Scottsboro Boys, who were not active within the movement but who nonetheless profoundly affected the artistic and political statements that came from Harlem Renaissance figures.