The History of the
After the World War I, in
No one knows for sure when the Harlem Renaissance period began and ended. Some say that it begun in the 1919 and ended during the early 1930s, but this is not official. Although no one knows for sure the time it began and ended its ideas lived much longer. When the stock market crashed in 1929 resulting in the great depression magazines were hosting parties for black writers. James Weldon Johnson preferred to call the flowering of Negro culture as Harlem Renaissance.
The participants of this movement were mostly descendants of parents that suffered slavery and the American Civil War. Many of their parents were part of the great Migration out the south. Seeking relief from prejudices and racism, also seeking for a better living.
The Harlem Renaissance was an African American involvement and an interpersonal support system of black patrons, black owned businesses and publications. This movement was supported by some white Americans who would help them publish their work. This “help” was called a patron. Then, there were those whites interested in so-called “primitive” cultures, as many whites viewed black American culture at that time and wanted to see this “primitivism” in the work coming out of the Harlem Renaissance. Other interpersonal dealings between whites and blacks can be categorized as exploitive because of the desire to capitalize on the “fad,” and “fascination” of the African American being in “vogue.” This vogue of the African American would extend to Broadway, as in Porgy and Bess, and into music where in many instances white band leaders would defy racist attitude to include the best and the brightest African American stars of music and song. For blacks, their art was a way to prove their humanity and demand for equality. For a number of whites, preconceived prejudices were challenged and overcome.
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