Capitalizing on White Crazes for Things Black": The Racial and Gender Politics of the New Negro Movement (original) (raw)

The New Negro and the Ideological Origins of the Integrationist Movement

1974

The literature of the Negro Renaissance needs to be reexamined frol the purview of the pervasiveness of the conflicts apparent in such literary, themes as the tragic mulatto, the glorified and idealistic African pasi, the alienation from American culture, and an impliedi, and at times overt, self-hatred. The Renaissance literature reflects the reality of the Negro as he indeed perceived himself regardless of color-the reality of the psycifological mulatto. Histroically, black scholars must re-evaluate the origins of the integrationist-movement. Even now most refuse to ask themselves if it was relevant to the Afrj.can-American working class laborers and farmers whether or not a-few Negroes got *equal opportunity" to become part of white America. Literary and other cultural aspects of the black American experiende mist be employed in the historiography of analyzing such questions as: Who really wanted this struggle for total assimilation in white culture and economics? Why is it that the Negro intellectuals, until recently, refused to be associated with anything *black** "revolutionary," or "African?" Unfortunately, present-day New Negroes, building on the faulty foundations of the 1920os, retard advancement of the race and deny the establishment of a legitimate black historical' tradition and black literary tradition.

Becoming African Americans: Black Public Life in Harlem, 1919-1939 (Harvard University Press, 2009)

2009

In 2000, the United States census allowed respondents for the first time to tick a box marked “African American” in the race category. The new option marked official recognition of a term that had been gaining currency for some decades. Africa has always played a role in black identity, but it was in the tumultuous period between the two world wars that black Americans first began to embrace a modern African American identity. Following the great migration of black southerners to northern cities after World War I, the search for roots and for meaningful affiliations became subjects of debate and display in a growing black public sphere. Throwing off the legacy of slavery and segregation, black intellectuals, activists, and organizations sought a prouder past in ancient Egypt and forged links to contemporary Africa. In plays, pageants, dance, music, film, literature, and the visual arts, they aimed to give stature and solidity to the American black community through a new awareness of the African past and the international black world. Their consciousness of a dual identity anticipated the hyphenated identities of new immigrants in the years after World War II, and an emerging sense of what it means to be a modern American. Winner, 2010 Biennial Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for First Book of History Commended, 2010 W. K. Hancock Prize, Australian Historical Association (one of two books shortlisted) Shortlisted, 2009 NSW Premier’s General History Prize (one of four books shortlisted) Choice (magazine of the American Library Association), “Outstanding Academic Title,” 2009

To Be American Is To Be Indebted To Blackness: Understanding Blackness as Constitutive of an

2023

In this paper, I argue that African-American’s fight for national inclusion and belonging, from the American Revolution to the late twentieth century, centres some of the founding contradictions and tensions of America’s democratic project even as it implores Americans to embark on a process of national healing and reconciliation. Starting with a discussion on the founding contradiction of the United States, embodied through the juxtaposition of its declaration of human equality while retaining the practice and institution of chattel slavery, I will show some of the earliest struggles and constraints placed on Black life in America and our ability to access meaningful and gratuitous entry into society. Following the North’s victory of the Civil War, American life saw an opportunity to effectively include now-freed Black Americans into its fold. Despite some of the achievements that highlighted Black American life during the Reconstruction Era, that, too, was mediated by forms of legalised discrimination such as segregated Jim Crow, particularly in the South. Eventually, the dehumanising trauma of slavery mixed with the experiences of Southern Jim Crow, as well as better job opportunities in the North, saw an influx of Black migrants to Northern States in what came to be dubbed the Great Migration. However, it would take over another half century, manifested in the Civil Rights Movement, for widespread, national organising, advocating for the acknowledgement and enforcement of Black folks' citizenship and the rights. This paper takes up these historical moments in African-American life, in an attempt to shed light not only on the obstacles, but also on the nuanced forms of physical and political resistance and ideological advancements that came to define these socio-political moments.

Redefining Blackness: The Past and Contemporary Memory of the Black Power Movement in America

2011

My research paper will discuss the elements of black consciousness and the unification of the African Diaspora through the establishment of the Black Power Movement, particularly focusing on the ideologies and teachings of black revolutionary leaders Malcolm X and Stockley Carmichael. I look to examine how the discovery of an ethnic identity can reshape the attitudes of black-Americans, specifically on the ideas of American citizenship, privilege and nationalist ideology. Does the prior memory of one’s being still remain – whether embraced or rejected – or does the embrace of a newfound identity override its remnants? What do nationalism and its historical rooting in Pan-Africanism do to this renewed identity? How has the definition of blackness been refined over the course of 15 years during this era of ethnic rebirth? As Carmichael stated, “We must do as Brother Malcolm says, we should examine history” in redefining and reclaiming the essence of blackness. The end goal of the Movement was to encourage black youth in America to adopt the black nationalist principles to transcend political, economic and social barriers and to empower the self through a revamped image of the Afro-American, the re-invention of the meaning of blackness, particularly against antitheses of normative societal expectations of the black community. Thus, through the re-examination of history, Malcolm X and Stockley Carmichael ignited black youth to redefine the ideals of “blackness” through empowerment by means of the Black Power Movement and ideas of black consciousness, in addition to restoring the essence of the Black experience within an American construct utilizing political power, shifting attitudes and thoughts of the black-American identity.

Negotiating the Boundaries of American Blackness

Exploring the Social and Academic Experiences of International Students in Higher Education Institutions

African students in the United States are assigned a racial identity ‘Black' in accordance with racial stratifications of the U.S. society. This designation makes it necessary for them to negotiate the structural constructions of American Blackness. Guided by social constructivism, the author explored African students' negotiation of Black racial solidarity. African students' racial solidarity was embedded within shared perspectives of common fate, which provided a reference for collective Black identity but; however, did not culminate into strong racial in-group loyalty. African students' racial solidarity was mitigated by the desire to exonerate themselves from inherent Black stereotypes. This was exacerbated by their non-prototypic cultural characteristics, which, according to native-born counterparts, rendered them ‘illegitimate' in-group members. The increasing presence of foreign-born Black students unveils both commonalities and heterogeneity among Black s...