W.E.B. Du Bois and his NAACP colleague James Weldon Johnson asserted that the only uniquely “American” expressive traditions in the United States had been developed by African Americans. They, more than any other group, had been forced to remake themselves in the New World, Du Bois and Johnson argued, while whites continued to look to Europe or sacrificed artistic values to … [Read more...] about Saturday Open Thread: The Niggerati and The Negrotarians
The Harlem Renaissance
Friday Open Thread: The Niggerati and The Negrotarians
The Costs of White Patronage This extraordinarily rich cultural moment, the Harlem Renaissance, in which it seemed possible that African Americans would take the lead in creating the cosmopolitan America that progressive writer Randolph Bourne had called for in the 1910s, won the attention and admiration of a good many white critics and intellectuals. In particular, … [Read more...] about Friday Open Thread: The Niggerati and The Negrotarians
Thursday Open Thread: The Harlem Renaissance – The Niggerati and the Negrotarians
It is impossible to engage in a complete discussion of the Harlem Renaissance without acknowledging the financial and tangible contributions of white patrons and their support of black intellectuals. White patronage had a profound effect on the vitality of the Harlem Renaissance, and evidence suggests that the Renaissance would not have reached the heights that it did without … [Read more...] about Thursday Open Thread: The Harlem Renaissance – The Niggerati and the Negrotarians
Wednesday Open Thread: The Harlem Renaissance – The Niggerati and the Negrotarians
Even before controversy erupted over the novel Nigger Heaven (published in 1926), white writers such as Eugene O’Neill and Julia Peterkin were staking their fortunes on representing blacks. Peterkin, for example, whose “rich” life on a former slave plantation in South Carolina had given her “plenty of material,” spoke for numerous white writers when she declared that “Negro” … [Read more...] about Wednesday Open Thread: The Harlem Renaissance – The Niggerati and the Negrotarians
Tuesday Open Thread: The Harlem Renaissance – The Niggerati and the Negrotarians
“Grabbing Our Stuff and Ruining It” The white people are pushing themselves among the colored. —Chandler Owen, “The Black and Tan Cabaret” Depending who you talk to, Carl Van Vechten was either a trusted friend and confidant to 1920s Harlem or an interloping tourist who used his privilege to get close to the period’s leading black culturati. That the white music … [Read more...] about Tuesday Open Thread: The Harlem Renaissance – The Niggerati and the Negrotarians