Reading Questions (video)
Why were many Black Americans pushed out of the South?
What were the factors the pulled people to the North?
How did violence affect the Great Migration?
What did Blacks experience once they got to their destinations?
How did southern whites react to the Great Migration?
What were some of the long term consequences of the Great Migration? (10:50)
What were the factors the pulled people to the North?
How did violence affect the Great Migration?
What did Blacks experience once they got to their destinations?
How did southern whites react to the Great Migration?
What were some of the long term consequences of the Great Migration? (10:50)
The Great Migration
The Great Migration was the relocation of more than 6 million African Americans from the rural South to the cities of the North, Midwest and West from about 1916 to 1970. Watch the video below and answer the reading Questions
The Harlem Renaissance
The Harlem Renaissance was an outcome of the Great Migration mentioned in the Crash Course video. The Harlem Renaissance was an artistic and cultural explosion among African Americans living in Harlem, New York in the 1920s. It produced some of the greatest American artists, musicians, and writers of all time, and expanded the identity and culture of a group that had been marginalized for hundreds of years.
The Harlem Renaissance was an artistic and cultural movement among African Americans living in Harlem, New York during the 1920's. Some of the greatest American artists of all time expressed themselves during this period. The movement sought self-expression, create cultural pride and to dispel the myth that blacks were incapable of producing creative and thought provoking works. As Americans experienced the Great Depression, the Harlem Renaissance began to wane; and as the U.S. entered World War II, African Americans continued to face segregation and discrimination practices. The Harlem Renaissance and its focus on pride helped influence the Civil Rights However, the influence of the Harlem Renaissance artists continue to influence American culture today.
The Harlem Renaissance was an artistic and cultural movement among African Americans living in Harlem, New York during the 1920's. Some of the greatest American artists of all time expressed themselves during this period. The movement sought self-expression, create cultural pride and to dispel the myth that blacks were incapable of producing creative and thought provoking works. As Americans experienced the Great Depression, the Harlem Renaissance began to wane; and as the U.S. entered World War II, African Americans continued to face segregation and discrimination practices. The Harlem Renaissance and its focus on pride helped influence the Civil Rights However, the influence of the Harlem Renaissance artists continue to influence American culture today.
The Writers |
Jazz, Blues and Theater |
Visual Artists |
Black Nationalism |
The Cotton Club
The Cotton Club became one of the most famous Jazz clubs. It served mostly white customers. Although it enforced segregation and perpetuated Black stereotypes of the era by having decor that reflected a plantation and having their waitresses dressed in jungle type attire, it did give many artists like Duke Ellington their start.
Red Summer
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The nearly 400,000 black men who had served in the armed forces during the war came home in 1919 and marched down the main streets of the industrial cities with other returning troops. And then (in New York and other cities), they marched again through the streets of black neighborhoods such as Harlem, led by jazz bands, cheered by thousands of African Americans, worshiped as heroes. The black soldiers were an inspiration to thousands of urban African Americans, a sign, they thought, that a new age had come. However, the war did little to change white attitudes toward segregation and race.
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By 1919, the racial climate had become savage and murderous. In the South, there was a sudden increase in lynching's: more than seventy blacks, some of them war veterans, died at the hands of white mobs in 1919 alone. In the North, black factory workers faced widespread layoffs as returning white veterans displaced them from their jobs. African American veterans found no significant new opportunities for advancement. Rural black migrants to northern cities encountered hostile white communities. Whites became convinced that black workers with lower wage demands were hurting them economically. The wartime riots in East St. Louis and elsewhere were a prelude to a summer of much worse racial violence in 1919. In Chicago, a black teenager swimming in Lake Michigan on a hot July day happened to drift toward a white beach. Whites on shore allegedly stoned him unconscious; he sank and drowned. Angry blacks gathered in crowds and marched into white neighborhoods to retaliate; whites formed even larger crowds and roamed into black neighborhoods shooting, stabbing, and beating passersby, destroying homes and properties. For more than a week, Chicago was virtually at war. In the end, 38 people died—15 whites and 23 blacks— and 537 were injured; over 1,000 people were left homeless. The Chicago riot was the worst but not the only racial violence during the so-called red summer of 1919; in all, 120 people died in such racial outbreaks in little more than three months.