Harlem Renaissance
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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The Harlem Renaissance (also known as the Black Literary Renaissance and New Negro Renaissance) refers to the flowering of African American literature, art, and drama during the 1920s and 1930s. Though centered in Harlem, New York, the movement impacted urban centers throughout the United States. Black novelists, poets, painters, and playwrights began creating works rooted in their own culture instead of imitating the styles of Europeans and white Americans.
African-American literary and artistic culture developed rapidly during the 1920s under the banner of "The Harlem Renaissance". In 1921, the Black Swan Corporation opened. At its height, it issued ten recordings per month. All-African-American musicals also started in 1921. In 1923, the Harlem Renaissance Basketball Club was founded by Bob Douglas. During the later 1920s, and especially in the 1930s, the basketball team became known as the best in the world.
The first issue of Opportunity was published. The African-American playwright, Willis Richardson, debuted his play The Chip Woman's Fortune, at the Frazee Theatre. Notable African-American authors such as Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston began to achieve a level of national public recognition during the 1920s. African American culture has contributed the largest part to the rise of jazz.
See also
- African American art
- List of African-American visual artists
- African American culture
- African American literature
- Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance (book)
- New Negro
- Niggerati
- Roaring Twenties