(needs further revision, bibliography not included)

     The Harlem Renaissance was influenced by African American artists centering in the Harlem section of New York City in the 1920?s and early 1930?s.  The Harlem Renaissance occurred at approximately the same time as the Great Migration, ?the mass movement of African-Americans from southern rural homes into major northern cities during and immediately following World War I? (Nash 153).  The movement displayed an increase in African-American writers, artists, and musicians in New York City.  Ironically, the main audience of these black artists was the upper-middle-class whites of New York who had an interest in learning about and experiencing black culture.  The Cotton Club was a famous and popular whites-only establishment with blacks as the entertainers and staff.  The Harlem Renaissance was not without controversy, especially among black writers George Schuyler, Countee Cullen, and Langston Hughes.  Schuyler argued in his essay ?The Nation? that ?your American Negro is just plain American? (Nash 153).  Hughes argued in his essay ?The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain? that African-American culture was unique and blacks need to have a sense of racial pride.  Hughes stated that this was ?the mountain standing in the way of any true Negro art in America? (Nash 153).     The Harlem Renaissance gifted us with many well-known and prominent black authors, poets, and essayists, including Countee Cullen, Zora Neale Hurston, Jean Toomer, Langston Hughes, and Alain Locke.   These authors are all considered to be part of the larger Modernist movement in American literature.  Literary Modernism was ?a breaking away from patterned responses and predictable forms? (PAL Ch 7).  The 1920?s, known as the Jazz Age and The Roaring Twenties, was a time when many Americans sought modern entertainment and liberation from prohibition laws.  Jazz, blues, and gospel music, one of the symbols of African-American cultural tradition, provided Americans with the entertainment they were seeking.     Alain Locke, a Harvard educated philosopher and educator, was the ?preeminent African-American intellectual of his generation? (Africa Within).  Locke promoted the contributions of black authors and introduced white America to the Harlem Renaissance.  His social views and philosophy put forth the idea of cultural pluralism where ?each culture group has its own identity and it is entitled to protect and promote it? (Harris). Locke wrote in his essay ?Harlem? that ?Harlem has become the greatest Negro community the world has known? (Locke).  The migration of rural blacks to northern urban areas allowed African-Americans to transform from southern peasant to urban intellectual.  Locke?s essay ?The New Negro? called this a new philosophy with a freedom of expression unknown before this time (Jackson 1).     Langston Hughes was the first African-American to support himself with his writing.  He wrote sixty books spread across many genres which included poetry, fiction, and children?s stories.  Hughes attended Columbia University in New York where he was drawn into Harlem black culture.  When Hughes became a sailor, he traveled to Africa and various parts of Europe.  Before leaving, Hughes had many of his works published.  Upon his return, he was surprised at the recognition his works received and how much influence he had on the Harlem Renaissance.  Hughes lived in Washington D.C. from 1924-1925.  It was there he experienced and saw social injustices towards the black population.  ?The Washington years were unhappy years; as a result, Hughes produced a great deal of poetry? (Dickinson 19). Hughes?s poems were infused with an appreciation of his African heritage.  His poem ?The Negro Speaks of Rivers? was both symbolic and autobiographical.  In his article ?The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain.? Hughes attempted to define the role of the black artist as ?we younger Negro artists who create now intend to express our individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame? (Jackson 4).   Countee Cullen was another important figure of the Harlem Renaissance.  Cullen was educated at Harvard University where he received and M.A. Cullen was generally a traditionalist greatly influenced by British and European romantic poets.  Cullen ?did not think of black poetry as having a separate identity, but attempted to make it part of the literature of his time? (Perkins 1185).  He insisted that poetry should be free of ?racial and political matters? (PAL Ch 9).  To the dismay and sometimes uproar of his contemporaries Hughes, Hurston, and Claude McKay, Cullen did not want to be recognized as a black poet.  However, much of Cullen?s work discussed issues that were predominately experienced by blacks.  In his poem ?Yet Do I Marvel? Cullen was questioning why God would punish a certain race of people.  His questioning was not a pessimistic view though, it was just a question.

     Woman writers made a significant contribution to this literary Renaissance.  The cultural tension and social injustices paralleled that of their male counterparts.  Jesse Fauset, as literary editor of ?The Crisis,? W.E.B. Du Bois?s popular publication dealing with issues such as racism and protest, was the first to publish Langston Hughes?s poetry.  She also encouraged Countee Cullen and Jean Toomer to keep writing.  Her novel ?Plum Bun? was the story of a racially mixed woman?s pursuit of romance, but in it she also criticized the limitations black artists must face as well as showed the difficulties faced by women in a male-dominated world.  Zora Neale Hurston was born in an all black town in Florida.  She ?grew up without being exposed to white racism? (Perkins 1290).  Hurston attended Howard University in Washington D.C. where she met and was encouraged by Alain Locke.  Her novel ?There Eyes Where Watching God? tells the story of ?one young black woman?s quest for self-determination and her salvation through immersion in the black folk culture of central Florida? (Nash 159). It is in this novel where Hurston argues that the black community needs to embrace its folk heritage.     With all the struggles and social injustices facing African-Americans at that time, the writers of the Harlem Renaissance held a very optimistic view of life.  Democracy and justice were close at hand and artists focused on the hope that America would soon transcend beyond the differences of race.  Although some argue that the Harlem Renaissance was a separate literary movement, the black artists shared the same ideals and desires as other authors of the larger Modernism movement. There is no argument that these African-American authors were or soon became literary giants and were respected by everyone. Because of the predominately white audience, and the talented way writers expressed racial conscience, these authors were able to show that, regardless of race, we are all Americans who share in the same struggles and triumphs.