The Harlem Renaissance Writers Reacting To Their...

The Harlem Renaissance emerged during turbulent times for the world, the United States, and black Americans. World War I and the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 had left the world in disorder and stimulated anticolonial movements throughout the third world. In America, twenty years of progressive reform ended with the red scare, race riots, and isolationism throughout 1919 and led to conservative administrations through the twenties. While blacks were stunned by racial violence near the end of the decade and were frustrated by the lack of racial progress that progressivism had made, they were now armed with new civil rights organizations and confronted the approaching decade with new hope and determination. Education and employment†¦show more content†¦While the Harlem Renaissance was not a political movement, its participants were affected by the political world around them and responded in varying ways to their political environment. nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;Perhaps the most direct way that black writers addressed political issues was through political and protest writings. Claude McKay’s 1919 sonnet â€Å"If We Must Die† expressed his anger toward the race riots of 1919 and urged blacks to respond with violence when confronted with force, working against the odds and gaining dignity through their struggles. He writes, â€Å"Like men we’ll face the murderous pack, / Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!†3 Similarly, Langston Hughes made protest a significant element in his works, especially in his somewhat radical poetry of the early 1930’s. â€Å"Because I am the white man’s son, his own / Bearing his bastard birth-mark on my face, / I will dispute his title to the throne, / Forever fight him for my rightful place.†4 wrote Hughes in his poem â€Å"Mulatto†. Throughout his poetry, he directly and indirectly referred to vigorous hatred for the white man, of his people’s dreams deferred too long. He used literature to protest the inequality faced by blacks nationwide. James WeldonShow MoreRelatedThe World s Best Hope1951 Words   |  8 Pagesracialist activism and potential political proxy. America had a well-established political system that ensured extensive industrial growth in a short period of time through use of the availability of cheap labour overseas to captivate upon the lucrative source of raw materials. One of the primary effective political plays was America’s maintained isolationism. This was demonstrated in Americas refrain from joining the League of Nations and their largely republican political view of ‘Laissez-faire’ – theRead MoreBlack Naturalism and Toni Morrison: the Journey Away from Self-Love in the Bluest Eye8144 Words   |  33 Pagesin a sense what they were questioning from the standpoint of literary criticism is not only the theory of postmodernism with its emphasis on race, class and gender, but the theory of naturalism as well: the idea that one s social and physical environments can drastically affect one s nature and potential for surviving and succeeding in this world. In this article, I will explore Toni Morr ison s The Bluest Eye from a naturalistic perspective; however, while doing so I will propose that because