LITR 5731: Seminar in
American Minority Literature
University of Houston-Clear Lake,
fall 2001
Student Research Project
Philonis Stevenson
Research Journal
LITR 5731
4 December, 2001
The
Renaissance: Harlem and Beyond
I grew up and went to school in the
segregated south, so I was introduced early to not only the slave narratives but
to the writers of The Harlem Renaissance. Of course teachers introduced me to
the most famous literary artists, such as Langston Hughes and Zora Neal Hurston.
It seemed odd to me though, that every time the study of a renaissance writer
was required, the same most popular ones re-surfaced. I assumed that there were
other renaissance artists out there, since my teachers told me The Harlem
Renaissance was a very important period in African American Literature. It
puzzled me since those writers were not in any of my textbooks. Over the years,
I came to realize that black writers were not in my textbooks because they were
not part of the American or European literary canon; consequently, many of my
teachers had gone out of their way to retrieve information and bring it to
class. I had a yearning to hear those "other" voices; however, I put
my inquiry aside, giving it about as much serious thought as a young person has
time for - none.
Much later and as I matured, it appeared to
me that before The Harlem Renaissance, African Americans did not have a voice.
It was through this period of "moving the race forward" as W. E. B.
DuBois called it, that they hoped to gain their voice, becoming what Alain Locke
called "The New Negro." Here, I must take a moment to explain. In the
book The New Negro Voices Of The Harlem Renaissance, by Alain Locke, the New
Negro or the "younger generation is vibrant with new psychology; the new
spirit is awake in the masses, and under the very eyes of the professional
observers is transforming what has been a perennial problem into the progressive
phases of contemporary Negro life" (3). In contrast, the Old Negro, of
course was "more myth than man." "...We must remember, [the
Negro] was a creature of moral debate and historical controversy. So for
generations in the mind of America, the Negro has been more of a formula than a
human being-a something to be argued about, condemned or defended, to be
"kept down," or "in his place," or "helped up," to
be worried with or worried over, harassed or patronized, a social bogey or
social burden" (3). The New Negro refused to allow himself be seen as such,
and preceded to try and change the perception that white America had of the
race. The old stereotype of the Old Negro perception caused my early teachers to
instill in their students, an "ignorance is not an option" attitude
about learning.
Consequently, I have since acquainted myself
with this period and its lesser names. I have also come to realize that a great
majority of women were participants in The Harlem Renaissance, and blacks in
Texas involved themselves in their own renaissance during those years. This
semester's study of the slave narratives and the other African American texts
re-awakened my interest in The Harlem Renaissance. Not only am I interested in
examining the driving force behind the writers; I want to investigate the music
and visual artists as well. The National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People (NAACP) and The Urban League, both of which were very active
during those years captivates me too. Also, during the years of the Harlem
Renaissance, Texas had its own Lone Star Renaissance. I am fascinated by the
idea that African American Texans found time to participate in the arts when for
the most part-- there was still cotton to pick. Although I will take a look at
Texas, my focus on Houston will be broader.
HARLEM RENAISSANCE WRITER - COUNTEE CULLEN
The era of The Harlem Renaissance (1920s -
early 1930s) marked significant growth of African Americans as literary artists.
African Americans demonstrated that they had something to contribute to the
literary community. The voices of these artists are unique and represent an
important period in not only African American history but also American history.
The writer often revealed his problems and protests against the restrictions
imposed upon the African American people through his work. One such writer was
Countee Cullen. Cullen was one of the most talented artists of the Harlem
Renaissance period. By the age of twenty-six, he had published three volumes of
original poetry. Cullen was a complex man both intellectually and emotionally,
and this spilled out into his work.
In one of his most famous poems, Heritage, it
is clear that he was in search of his African roots and those of all African
Americans. Cullen poses and answers at the same time the question of what Africa
is to him. Such pondering suggests that he was trying to identify Africa in
relation to himself, (as did many African Americans, I suspect). The poem points
out that it had been three centuries since African Americans had been uprooted
from the motherland; Africa. The question became could Cullen, or any African
American, regain the African experience and reunite himself with his culture and
his past? For years Blacks had been denied anything important about their
heritage. Did they believe anything important existed? In his article, The
Racial Roots of Culture, first published in1920 and later re-printed in African
Fundamentalism A Literary and Cultural Anthology of Garvey's Harlem Renaissance,
edited by Toni Martin, the writer Hubert H. Harrison said the following:
"Negro boys and girls know nothing of the stored-up knowledge and
experience of the past and present generations of Negroes in their ancestral
lands, and conclude there is no such store of knowledge and experience. They
readily accept the assumption that Negroes have never been anything but slaves
and that they never had a glorious past, as did other fallen peoples like the
Greeks and Persians" (Martin 9). The African American is confused as he
tries to determine if he should abandon any attempt at connection with his
African past, in hope of full assimilation.
Cullen realized that full assimilation into
American culture was impossible, so Heritage and some of his other works present
an identity conflict. Although Cullen was American, he was African. He wanted to
be identified as simply a poet and not a Negro poet. He did not write in black
dialect. Instead, his role models were Keats and Shelly. Still, Cullen knew that
emancipation had not set him free. Whites in North America still expected
African Americans to remain mentally enslaved, or to see themselves as less than
their white counterparts. This was reflected in his poem "Incident":
Once riding in old Baltimore,
Heart-filled, head-filled with glee,
I saw a Baltimorean
Keep looking straight at me.
Now I was eight and very small,
And he was no wit bigger,
And so I smiled, but he poked out
His tongue, and called me,
"Nigger."
I saw the whole of Baltimore
From May until December;
Of all the things that happened there
That's all that I remember.
This type of superior attitude and the
feeling of worthlessness it fostered is what the New Negro hoped to abolish
through his work in the Harlem Renaissance.
WOMEN OF THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE
Women. Where do they fit in? The words Harlem
Renaissance automatically conjure up images of men--Countee Cullen, Langston
Hughes, Jean Toomer, Claude McKay and more too numerous to name. However, if one
were to be asked to name the women of that period, only three names would in all
likelihood be mentioned: Zora Neal Hurston, Nella Larsen and Jessie Redmond
Fauset --and perhaps not the latter. However, according to Lorraine Elena Roses
and Ruth Elizabeth Randolph, in their book The Harlem Renaissance and Beyond,
"well over a hundred black women wrote plays, novels, poetry, short
stories, children's books and essays in the 1920s and the 1930s alone, although
very little has been written about their lives or work" (xxiv). Just to
mention a few of the artists there were Alice Dunbar Nelson, Dorothy West,
Helene Johnson, Georgia Douglas Johnson, Gwendolyn Bennett, and Ann Spencer.
And, these women were just as serious as their male counterparts. However, most
female writers were "constrained by the external realities of segregation,
institutionalized discrimination, and exclusion from the suffrage movement. The
black women writers of the early 1900s nevertheless were determined to transcend
circumstances" (Roses and Randolph xxiii).
The systematic omission of women's work from
the Harlem Renaissance canon seems strange and out of place in a minority
culture, especially when African Americans as a whole were trying to take great
strides in the literary arena. Apparently those women who were lucky enough to
benefit from the Harlem Renaissance were "tokens," ( as Roses and
Randolph call them) placed there just to provide a female presence. This
tokenism is what caused their male counterparts to be considered the real
writers. Furthermore, "often the competing demands of family, livelihood,
profession, religion, and social activism meant that much of these women's time
was spent in ways relating to their gender roles, which detracted from their
writing" (Roses and Randolph xxvi). Still, many of them wrote literature
and poetry dynamic to their cause. Marion S. Lakey made the following statement
in his essay On Miss Dunlap's Poems, written in 1923 at the beginning of the
Harlem Renaissance: "Of all writers of poetry who have written for the
cause of regaining the continent of Africa for the Negro people, Ethel Trew
Dunlap is at once observed to be the most prominent. She is untiring in her
efforts for the African cause, and is no less acute to the other phases of the
great problem of the Negro race in America and elsewhere. She is a staunch
defender of her race, and some of the poems written in defense of her people are
pregnant with noble interpretation and spiritual appeal" (Martin 66). Her
idea of "African redemption" can be seen in her following poem,
"Native Love":
Come to me, my little lamb,
Virgin black of land of Ham,
Like a lambkin gone astray,
From thy native fold away.
We are far from Afric (sic) shore
That our blood makes us adore.
In thine (sic) eye is Nubia's blaze,
Careless thine, (sic) like Egypt's ways.
Blessed Jesus made us black;
Some day he may take us back
Where the palms are sighing now
To caress our absent brow.
They have robbed us of the Nile,
But it flows back in our smile.
Be my continent they stole
Though we never reach its goal;
In each other let us find
Tropic lands we left behind!
Apparently those women who managed to write
and get published did not concern themselves with meaningless rhetoric. Those
women dedicated their writing to change on many levels.
THE MUSIC
Music. It is said to be the universal
language. No matter what one's heritage or social background, harmonious melody
is appreciated. From the beginning of time, man has had a passion for music. The
lyre conjures up images of Nero passionately playing his instrument as Rome
burned. The harpsichord transports one to Shakespeare's world, and drums take
African Americans on a journey buried deep inside connecting their souls with
the Yorba talking drum. The music of The Harlem Renaissance is even more
dramatic.
The music of the Harlem Renaissance was
glamorous, sensual, exotic, and sophisticated all at the same time. It was Jazz;
the only true American musical art form. Jazz is an offspring of African and
European cultures that could not help but have an influence on each other. The
two cultures un-consentingly copulated, and jazz was born. It is important to
realize, however, that no matter what its parentage, poor working class African
Americans created this musical tradition. Jazz is the music of blacks. Artists
such as Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington set the tone for the era. Clubs like
The Cotton Club, Connie's Inn, The Savoy and The Ragland Ballroom provided
plenty of work for the big bands and individual performers. The music was not
confined to Harlem; in fact it came from the south, in the Delta country, and
moved across the American landscape, stimulating everyone in its path.
African American music was deeply affected by
the social currents of the 1920s. Previously confined to the south, jazz and
blues were first played in northern cities during World War I (1914-1918) and
soon became established in the rapidly growing northern black communities. As an
outgrowth of blues, the spontaneity of jazz expanded the role of musical
improvisation and was featured in the many clubs that thrived throughout Harlem.
One of the first singers to make the
crossover from blues to jazz was Bessie Smith, a Southerner whose extensive
recording career was rare among black performers of the day. Another artists to
emerge from the south was trumpeter Louis Armstrong, who put a new twist on the
swinging New Orleans sound, and in 1922 brought his talent to Chicago to play
with King Oliver's jazz band. Jelly Roll Morton began arranging the previously
spontaneous jazz pieces during the mid-1920s, paving the way for the big band
leaders such as Duke Ellington and Fletcher Henderson. Playing with the Fletcher
Henderson Orchestra was tenor saxophonist Coleman Hawkins who developed the
bebop style of jazz. Leading his own band at the legendary Cotton Club, Duke
Ellington came to personify Harlem jazz with the sounds of muted brass
instruments and high, wailing clarinets; distinctive harmonies; his unique piano
playing; and unusual combinations of instruments (Encarta articles).
http://encarta.msn.com/schoolhouse/harlem/hrmusic.asp
Many critics of The Harlem Renaissance's
music labeled it as decadent and unconventional. Josephine Baker's infamous
banana skirt and the dance she performed to wild, distorted, syncopated beats
and rhythms caused some people to believe that the musicians and other club
performers lacked morals. But as the controversy grew, so did the staying power
of the music.
THE VISUAL ARTS
Just as there was controversy in the literary
and musical arts, similar issues surfaced in the visual arts. Some of the same
terms used to describe the music such as decadent and exotic were used to
describe the visual arts as well. And, many of the images were considered
primitive and seductive too. Artist James Lesesne Wells said, "the Negro
was confused as to whether he should just think of being artist, sculptor and/or
painter, and not race" (The Harlem Renaissance)
White America had a fascination with the
"dark continent" and African Americans capitalized on it. Some artists
and ordinary African Americans in general believed that artists were simply
feeding into the stereotypes that whites had concerning blacks. Other African
American entertainers and artists, however, felt that they should benefit from
their own culture. Plus, they were able to wear wonderful costumes and look
beautiful instead of like the pick-a- ninnies and buffoons that whites portrayed
them as when they performed in blackface.
On the other hand, there were artists such as
Alan Freland who concerned himself with solving the technical problems of light
and color. He did not feel connected to Africa. He just wanted to be an artist.
And even though he committed to the New Negro Movement, he wanted to be judged
as an individual
(The Harlem Renaissance). Sounds familiar,
doesn't it? But because of the New Negro Movement, people such as Alain Locke
wanted art to be socially relevant. There were several artists who were at the
forefront spearheading the visual arts revolution during this period of black
cultural history. During the Harlem Renaissance there were mainly four black
artists, each who, like so many others were actively engaged in the art world of
Harlem and the transitional period. These artists were Meta Fuller, Palmer
Hayden, William H. Johnson and of course Aaron Douglas who produced socially
relevant art that was realistically done in the exploration of Black life and
artistic themes.
The Harlem Renaissance was lauded as the
period in the History of black American culture that promoted the art Of African
American arts and ancestry. Visual artists Meta Fuller, Palmer Haden, William
Johnson, and Aaron Douglas, whose work left a lasting impression on black
artists, were virtually the visual Harlem Renaissance. But their influence
should not be limited to the Harlem Renaissance, but instead as defining roles
in the broader context of American art.
Meta Fuller's art bridged the gap between the
black presences In European art and the gradual acceptance of the black artists
as a whole. She worked hard to broaden the level of visual literacy among the
black community and directed their appreciation to the important forms of
creative expression within their own culture. Aaron Douglas, Palmer Hayden, and
William H. Johnson continued Fuller's legacy. Each of these artists responded
with a visual literacy that virtually looked at themselves as artists and to the
art of Africa for the inspiration needed to create a world-class movement during
the Harlem Renaissance (Belton).
http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/2000/4/00.04.01.x.html
The visual artists of the Harlem Renaissance
managed to produce excellent works of art. As they attempted to capture Africa
while being influenced by the European masters and contemporary artists of the
time, they created art that was truly American.
THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT
OF COLORED PEOPLE
During the years of the Harlem Renaissance,
the social climate between the black and white races was not to be admired.
African Americans were plagued by the situations that segregation created. The
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was created
as a voice of the blacks. As such, the organization spoke out against racial
injustice. One of the creators of the organization was W. E. B. Du Bois. The
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was organized
in New York, in 1909. Its primary concerns were the social injustices
perpetrated against African Americans. In the book Black Writers of America A
Comprehensive Anthology, Richard Barksdale and Keneth Kinnamon state:
"During the 1920s hundreds of thousands of blacks had arrived in New York,
Chicago, Detroit, Philadelphia, Cleveland, and other urban centers. This massive
movement is known as the Great Migration" (468). The Great Migration
brought blacks from the farms and rural communities to worlds filled with
excitement and promise. However, the north was hardly synonymous with
integration. For example, blacks could work and perform at clubs like The Cotton
Club or The Savoy, but they were not allowed as patrons.
Furthermore, most of the jobs they obtained
were menial at best. The color line was in force but the NAACP sought to remove
it with Crisis, the magazine of the NAACP. W. E. B. DuBois was its editor. In
the lead editorial of the first issue of the magazine, Dr. Du Bois defined the
policy and indicated the goals of The Crisis. The text of that editorial
follows:
The objective of this publication is to set
forth those facts and arguments which show the danger of race prejudice,
particularly as manifested today toward colored people. It takes its name from
the fact that the editors believe that this is a critical time in the history of
the advancement of men. Catholicity and tolerance, reason and forbearance can
today make the make the world-old dream of human brotherhood approach
realization; bigotry and prejudice emphasized race consciousness and force can
repeat the awful history of the contact of nations and groups in the past. We
strive for this higher and broader vision of Peace and Good Will. The policy of
THE CRISIS will be simple and well defined: It will first and foremost be a
newspaper: it will record important happenings and movements in the world, which
bear on the great problem of inter-racial relations, and especially those which
affect the Negro-American. Second, it will be a review of opinion and
literature, recording briefly books, articles, and important expressions of
opinion in the white and colored press on the race problem.
Third, it will publish a few short articles.
Finally, Its editorial page will stand for the rights of men, Irrespective of
color or race, for the highest ideals of American democracy, and for reasonable
but earnest and persistent attempts to gain these rights and realize these
ideals. The magazine will be the organ of no clique or party and will avoid
personal rancor of all sorts. In the absence of proof to the contrary it will
assume honesty of purpose on the part of all men, North and South, white and
black (Moon).
http://www.thecrisismagazine.com/his hlm.htm
When DuBois took the reins of the NAACP and
Crisis Magazine, he was obsessed with shaping the future of the African American
people. The flood of blacks entering New York during the Harlem Renaissance
reaffirmed his stance to help his people achieve unity and power.
THE URBAN LEAGUE
Unlike DuBois and the NAACP that was
concerned with the New Negro, who would emerge from the talented tenth and
qualify to advance the race, the Urban
League's concern was for all African
Americans. The organization was developed to help assist African Americans
achieve social and economic change and mainstream them into economic security.
Their mission is as follows: "To enable African Americans to secure
economic self-reliance, parity and power and civil rights." The Urban
League was founded in 1910, one year after the NAACP. It went through several
name changes. "On September 29, 1910 in New York City, the Committee on
Urban Conditions Among Negroes was established. A year later, the Committee
merged with the Committee for the Improvement of Industrial Conditions Among
Negroes in New Your (founded in New York in 1906), and the National League for
the Protection of Colored Women (founded in 1905) to form the National League on
Urban Conditions Among Negroes. In 1920, the name was later shortened to the
National Urban League."
http://www.nul.org/90th/history.html
The organization's concern centered on with
the harsh economic conditions of those who were products the Great Migration.
There was great disparity because there were so many people crowded into the
city and not enough jobs. Many African Americans found the idea of the north as
a "promised land" to be a hoax. Many lived in awful, cold, rat
infested dwellings. The Urban League aimed to be instrumental in helping people
change those conditions. The National Urban League's Opportunity Magazine,
edited by sociologist Charles S. Johnson, was one of the most important journals
published during the Harlem Renaissance. Though its circulation was often
dwarfed by its larger competitor,(sic) the NAACP's The Crisis, Opportunity
served as the training ground for many New Negro (Wilson).
http://aalbc.com/books/harlem.htm
THE LONE STAR RENAISSANCE
Harlem intrigued just about every urban
African American community across the United States. Communities created what
they called "Little Harlem." This was true of Texas, and of course,
Houston. There were nine dance halls for African Americans that were black owned
and operated. Five of the dance halls were in the Fourth Ward. Those five were:
The Pilgrim Auditorium, Harlem Grill, I. L. A. Hall, Drill Room, Odd Fellows
Temple and Elks est. There were theaters for the arts also located in Fourth
Ward. They were the Booker T. Washington Theater, St. Elmo Theater, Lincoln
Theater and Ideal Theater. These places brought in such acts as Calvin's Lucky
Five "Those Jazzing Boys from Dixie" and Mamie Smith and her Jazz
Hounds. The City Auditorium also had days in which events would be held for
black patrons. The auditorium located downtown in close proximity to Fourth
Ward. Texas was not left out of the literary scene either. Neil Sapper explains
in his dissertation, Black Culture In Urban Texas: A Lone Star Renaissance,
"black culture in Texas was by black artists within the black urban
community for black audiences. Although some exceptional cases like J. Mason
Brewer, the first black member of the Texas
Folklore Society, could be cited it should be recalled that Brewer also wrote
racially conscious poetry that was not accommodationist in tone. Black culture
in Texas was created, in the main, for black Texans and stands as their
authentic expression in the arts" (Sapper 77).
There has been some criticism of the Harlem
Renaissance Supposedly the Harlem Renaissance was aimed toward whites and not
African Americans; however, this is speculative. One can only assume that these
critics missed the mark, concerning what was being attempted in terms of moving
the race forward culturally. However, a statement of that nature could not hold
up about Texas and her Lone Star Renaissance. "The public attention and
support obtained by black artists in the state was gained without concerted
encouragement from white patrons critics. If anything, the usual white response
was to burlesque black efforts or to ignore them" (Sapper 76).
Houston's African American newspaper, The
Informer, "sought to awaken greater artistic activity among the black
people of Texas..." (Sapper 57). The informer was instrumental in getting
blacks to search themselves for artistic talent. The paper tried to encourage
its readers to send in any poems or literature or short sketches that they had
created. Reader contributions were published. The paper's Dreamship section was
dedicated to publishing four to five poems weekly. The participants were
encouraged to use Dreamship as an outlet of expression on just about anything.
Examine the following poem by Bernice Love-Wiggins, published in the March 6,
1920 issue.
Ethiopia Speaks:
Lynched!
Somewhere in the South the "Land of the
Free."
To a very strong branch of a dogwood tree,
Lynched! One of my sons-
When the flag was in danger they answered the
call
I gave them my black sons, ah, yes gave them
all
When you came to me.
You called them sons of a downtrodden race,
The Negro you said, in his place must stay.
To be seen in your midst is deemed a disgrace,
I remember, o yes, still I gave them that day
Your flag to defend.
And knew when I sent them to your fields of battle.
To suffer, to bleed, to be hewn down like cattle,
Not to them the plaudit, should vict'ty (sic) they win.
History scarcely records it-to dark was their skin.
"Twas truth I spoke in.
My Sons:
How it greaves me for I taught them; 'tis true
That this was their country, and for her to die
Was non less than loyal--the right thing to do
Brave and loyal they proved, and now they ask why
Their country ill treats them, because they are black.
Must I take it back?
Why not take it back?
Until in the South the "Land of the Free"
They stop hanging my sons to the branch of a tree
Take it back till they cease to burn them alive.
Take it back till the White man shall cease to deprive
My sons, yea, my black sons, of rights justly won
Till tortures are done?
Mary wept for her tortured son, in days of yore,
Ethiopia forgives, but remembers still,
And cries unto God with uplifted hands.
"Innocent bloods bathe the lands."
Lynched!
Somewhere in the South the "Land of the Free"
To a very high branch of a very strong tree.
Lynched! One of my sons-
When the flag drooped so lowly, they heeded the call
Democracy offers a cup filled with gall
As their reward.
This is certainly a powerful poem. It rivals
any of the poetry written in Harlem by its renaissance leaders. It is clear why
the Houston Informer billed itself as the "South's Greatest Race
Newspaper." Texas and especially Houston's involvement in the arts
certainly establishes a Lone Star Renaissance.
CONCLUSION
Compiling this research journal taught me
what it meant to be one of the talented tenth, a New Negro. The responsibility
was enormous. One had to be educated but at the same time if a person was a
child of a Du Bois or a Locke, he was expected to excel. What if he did not have
it in him? That is pressure. Education was for the well to do. Ordinary people
were too busy trying to survive from day to day. It's been about eighty years
since the Harlem and Lone Star Renaissance, and the average African American is
still trying to eke out a living. College is still unattainable for many. I
wonder, if Du Bois were alive, what would he think of the strides the race has
taken? All serious students of literature should study the Harlem Renaissance
because it links to other study. That is how I stumbled upon the Lone Star
Renaissance. I had never heard of it until I began to sleuth around. I found
what I consider valuable poetry from plain ordinary Texans who had something to
express. I will share the poetry with my classes. The poems should provide
interesting classroom discussion from which I can draw essay prompts. I love to
read and write poetry. However, when I create a poem I have always opted for the
shorter, less controversial themes. After reading Ethiopia Speaks, it caused me
to wonder if I am afraid of what will come out with longer verse. I felt
something strange and unnerving when I read that poem.
The participants in the renaissances, both
Harlem and Lone Star, left their permanent mark on history. They understood what
all must understand, that no one can have a real identity with his or her
heritage without knowing what it really is. Knowing one's heritage gives that
person a frame of reference that sparks his creativity. As African Americans, we
must capture the knowledge of our ancestors who were proud to be known as
Ethiopian, Theban, African, Libyan, Nubian, Cushite, Numidian, Memphite and many
more long forgotten. They were people of leadership. They were proud. Those
involved in the Harlem Renaissance and the Lone Star Renaissance, struggled with
their art to create something that all African Americans could claim so they
could remember that they once walked as kings.
Works Cited
Barksdale, Richard, and Kenneth Kinnamon Black
Writers of America A Comprehensive Anthology. New York: Macmillian, 1972.
Belton, Val-Jean. "African American Art
and the Political Dissent during the Harlem Renaissance" 24 Nov. 2001
http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/2000/4/00.04.01xhtml
Encarta Articles "The Harlem
Renaissance" 27 Nov. 2001
http://encarta.msn.com'schoolhouse/harlem/music.asp
Frome, Ethan. "History of the National
Urban League" 27 Nov. 2001
Harrison, Hubert H. "The Racial Roots of
Culture." African Fundamentalism A Literary and Cultural Anthology of
Garvey's Harlem Renaissance. Ed.Tony Martin. Massachusetts: Majority Press,
1991. 8-9.
Lakey, Marion S. "On Miss Dunlap's
Poems." African Fundamentalism A Literary and Cultural Anthology of
Garvey's Harlem Renaissance. Ed. Tony Martin. Massachusetts: Majority Press,
1991. 66-68.
Locke, Alain, ed. The New Negro Voices of
the Harlem Renaissance. New York: Atheneum, 1992.
Love-Wiggins, Bernice. "Ethiopia
Speaks." Houston Informer 6 March 1920.
Ross, Lorraine Elena, and Ruth Elizabeth
Randolph Introduction. The Harlem Renaissance and Beyond. Boston: G. K.
Hall & Co., 1990. xxiv; xxiii.
Sapper, Neil. Black Culture in Urban
Texas: A Lone Star Renaissance.
Diss. Texas Tech University.1972. Ann Arbor: UMI, 1979.
The Harlem Renaissance.
Dir. Amber Edwards. New Jersey Council for the Humanities
Wilson, Sondra Kathryn, ed. "Selections
From the Urban League's Opportunity
Magazine". The Opportunity Reader
1999. 27 Nov 2001
http://aalbc.com/books/harlem3.htm