#blackbabies, #BLACKJOY, #F.U.B.U, Crisis Magazine, Survey Graphic: Harlem Mecca of the New Negro

Uplifting the New Negro

The covers of The Crisis characterize the misconstrued thoughts, feelings, and way of life that black people experience in America. These covers are for the hopeful, defiant, and blueprints for the soon-to-be black nationalists. These covers suggest that the New Negro are viable beings. That the New Negro is a survivor. New Negros  continue to evolve through their confounding experience in America. The New Negro did not die. Despite micro-aggressions and the patent target for several acts of violence, the New Negro multiplies. Beautiful black babies are portrayed with their mothers (Crisis Volume 11, Fig 1). Or these babies are portrayed on their own (Crisis Volume.5, No. 6& Crisis Volume 10, No.6). These black babies vitalize hope for the New Negro to become a black nationalist. These babies symbolize the continuation of the New Negros. They stand out to remind the New Negro that there is hope to meet others like themselves in America.  The New Negro no longer suffers an identity crisis or questions their representation in areas outside the home.

The New Negro are innovators and architects. Like Maya Angelou says, The New Negro starts to rise (“Still I Rise”). They are achieving feats that were once considered impossible. From large barriers to entry for higher education. The Crisis broke the barrier of the New Negro’s lack of nonviolent representation in the media(Henry Louis Gates, Jr., 137). The Crisis covers do not paint the New Negro with oversized features or use them for ignorant entertainment purposes. Parting through that barrier and receiving secondary degrees(Crisis Volume 24, No.4 & Vol. 20, No. 3). The New Negro is a divine athlete (Crisis Volume 22, No.5), an educator (Crisis Volume 24, No.1), and a person of endless possibilities. These covers are reframing the ignorant associations that pursued New Negro  women into educated, empowered, talented, and “sweet”  (Gates, Jr., 142), beings.

The New Negro finds love (Crisis Volume 8 No.3) with one another. Defiant in destructing their trauma. Or the newfound comfort in their shared oppression. They empathize and sympathize through their experiences. Together they are “to defy” (Gates, Jr., 147) their oppressors with their common language. Together they become a strong force with their common misconstrued thoughts, feelings, and way of life. Hope and defiance are built with their togetherness as the New Negro joins an unwelcoming society. They are defiant in surviving in this society and embarking on the blueprint to becoming a black nationalist. They are eager to share their undying love for themselves with future generations to erase years of trauma. Defiant in excess love from themselves as it is scarce from anyone else.

The New Negro is a delight. The New Negro are divine and defiant delights. The New Negro is a half step away from a black nationalist.  Enchanting in their achievements through their pains. The New Negro is kindred to the flower sprouting anew from the moribund ones below (Crisis Vol. 20, No. 2).  The New Negro is reborn from the captivity of a blasphemous narrative. The New Negro is a delight. The New Negro is starting to make triumphant noises in their freedom for Harlem and the rest of the world to witness. The New Negro amplifies their activities of educating, marrying, and completing tasks made strenuous because they were not created with a New Negro in mind. The New Negro is a delight.

Gates, Henry Louis. “The Trope of a New Negro and the Reconstruction of the Image of the Black.” Representations, no. 24, 1988, pp. 129–55.

Du, Bois W. E. B. The Crisis. New York: Crisis Pub. Co, 1910-

Du, Bois W.E.B. The Crisis. New York, “New Negro amplifying his freedom in poetry”: Vol. 9, No. 4 (February 1915)

Du, Bois W.E.B. The Crisis. New York, “New Negro woman and her baby amplifying their life”: The Crisis, Vol. 11, No. 4. (February 1916)

Du, Bois W.E.B. The Crisis. New York, “New Negro encouraging his brethren to amplify their voice and not be silent”: The Crisis, Vol. 13, No. 5. (March 1917)

Du, Bois W.E.B. The Crisis. New York, “New Negro woman amplifying her education possibilities”: The Crisis, Vol. 24, No. 4. (August 1922)

#blackfeminism, #evolving, #roots, #wedontdie, #wemultiply, Crisis Magazine, Printing on the Colorline

Endorsement of New Negros by New Negros

Imaginative work leaves ample room for the viewer to interpret the piece according to their own needs. Nonfiction work slashes the room for interpretation to an infinitely small percentage. Fictive work concerns the viewer with the appearance of what the creator intends. Nonfictive work concerns the viewer with the actuality of what the creator intends. Nonfictive work does not oppose ignorance whereas fictive does. Poems are open to interpretation and data is not.

It may seem that there is no grey area between the two, but this is untrue. There is the possibility of the crossover between data transforming into nonfiction and fictive work. This crossover is the equation for success. Not only does it capture the audience of nonfiction and fiction hysterics, leading to a greater audience, but it can deliver its purpose soundly.

Du Bois Crisis magazine was able to successfully find a balance between appearance and actuality. Not only did it find a balance but other magazines began to copy its style (“Printing the Color Line in The Crisis”, Donal Harris 69).  The Crisis “magazine work are known for a realism that, if anything, verges on the archetypalism and abstraction of romance” (Harris 86). There is realism in The Crisis covers because they characterize the New Negro in their everyday life. There is nothing fictitious about the New Negro graduating (Du Bois, Crisis Vol. 24, No.4)  or finding love (Du Bois, Crisis Vol. 8, No.3). However, as the viewer concerns themself with the cover of Du Bois’s magazines, the content is far from imaginary. If the viewer only pays attention to the art, they fall into the trap of  “‘hodge-podge”‘ (Harris 64). As a result, they lose the message of the New Negro. They lose their ability to hear the New Negro’s voice.

Du Bois comments and actively works towards dismantling the oppression of the New Negro(Harris 81). He speaks the common tongue of the New Negro. He informs and advertises for fellow New Negros. He places a megaphone on the New Negro’s voice. He places a magnifying glass on the written voices of New Negros. Although not many artists and writers were able to represent themselves in The Crisis, their voices reached broader audiences for the first time.

Similarly, there is a grey area of success between data and poems.  Data is not easily manipulated unless you are trying to swindle your audience. Claude McKay in his poem, “Like a Strong Tree”, manipulated data to strengthen the image of the New Negro. The New Negro is “Like a strong tree that reached down, deep, deep, For sunken water, fluid underground” (Mckay 1). There is substantial evidence that sturdy trees “send their roots many meters down to the saturated zone just above the groundwater table” (“Without Much Rain, Roots Dive Deep to Find Water”, Todd Bates-Rutgers 1).  A sturdy tree is also “resourceful and resilient to environmental stress and climate change” (Bates-Rutgers 1). McKay supports this in his poem by comparing the New Negro to a strong tree “against a thousand storms” (McKay 1). The New Negro is resilient and adapts to a lack of support in their newfound freedom through grounding themselves through their united and intensified voice.

Bates-Rutgers, Todd. “Without Much Rain, Roots Dive Deep to Find Water.” Futurity, Futurity, 18 Sept. 2017, https://www.futurity.org/root-depth-soil-hydrology-1546972/.

McKay, Claude. “Like a Strong Tree by Claude McKay – Poems | Academy of American Poets.” Poets.org, Academy of American Poets, 1925, https://poets.org/poem/strong-tree.

Harris, Donal. “Printing the Color Line in The Crisis.” On Company Time: American Modernism in the Big Magazines, Columbia University Press, 2016, pp. 61–106. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7312/harr17772.6.
Du, Bois W. E. B. The Crisis. New York: Crisis Pub. Co, 1910-
#Doubleconciousness, #F.U.B.U, forusbyus, Opportunity Magazine

Credence of a New Negro

THE RIDDLE by Geogia Douglas Johnson.

“My Race” written by Helene M. Johnson and “The Riddle” by Georgia Douglas Johnson starts as described; a riddle. A mystery. A puzzle piece. A riddle is usually associated with a game and associated with a joke. It is also something that is challenging and a brain-strengthening activity. M. Johson and D. Johnson’s poems are thought-provoking for the reader. Both poets invoke the question of did they intend to make a joke about what their publisher, Opportunity, is trying to achieve for the New Negro?

M. Johnson does not go into immense detail about the race she is referring to in her poem. M. Johnson could not possibly be discussing the white race. Yet, maybe she is discussing the race of a poor white person in Harlem. During this period of slavery, poor whites equate as slaves. Poor whites were indebted to wealthy white slave owners. They were hired as overseers of slaves but owned none. They were hired as overseers of the land but owned zero acres. They equated slaves in the social hierarchy as some could not read or write ( “Poor Whites and Slavery in Antebellum South”, Keri Leigh Merrit 1). Poor whites were also disadvantaged like the New Negro when they became freed people (Merrit 1). The crucial difference between poor whites and slaves is their experience; poor whites held roles of importance and the degradation of slaves. The New Negro was never able to have ownership roles or truly degrade each other. M. Johnson is also interpreting that although she might describe her feelings in this poem, they will materialize to the reader as minute words. Words of nothing. They become words of “Careless mirth”(“My Race”, M. Johnson). In other words, the New Negro’s strifeful experience could be placed in Opportunity for eternity, but, the marked and integrated audience will not care or understand. That is the inside joke; the audience will not commiserate or care enough to solve it. M. Johnson wants the audience to comprehend but is not innocuous to the integrated audience of Opportunity. M. Johnson writes this poem as an internal joke and hopes the audience will laugh with her. M. Johnson is criticizing the goal of the Opportunity which is to appeal to a grander audience other than the New Negro. The poem could resonate with any race, however, this poem was written by the New Negro; for the New Negro.

Georgia Douglas Johnson does the opposite of M. Johnson. She begins her poem with the race she intends on discussing. The title and the concept are a riddle. However, D. Johnson understands that it is not funny. She does not care whom she offends. Her poem is more complex. The New Negro, whose ancestors were unwillingly integrated with the white man for profit, understands the concept of “uniting and blending”(“The Riddle”, D. Johnson). The integrated audience will not understand this concept. The joke D. Johnson makes is that a select few will understand this struggle and history will solve the riddle. The unchosen will not and that is her inside joke; that is true s**t. Similar to a rainbow, D. Johnson comments on the descent the New Negro faces in their newfound lives. A rainbow is comparable to the Gateway Arch in St. Louis or a negative-faced parabola. After a certain point on these arches, the New Negro resides in the area of downward slopes of the arch. The New Negro does not reach the break-even point; they do not reach the top of the rainbow. It does not matter if the New Negro is mixed with “White man’s”(D. Johnson) blood. D. Johnson’s words are illuminating. Her riddle is highly thought-provoking. Her poem is based on her experience as a mixed-race woman during the Harlem Renaissance (“Georgia Douglas Johnson”, Nick Lamb). Her words are true s**t. D. Johnson mentions a triton, which is a “demi-god Triton a Son of Poseidon and Aphrodite who in mythology was half man half fish” (Lamb 1). D. Johnson upholds the perspective of solely a black person, even though she is mixed race. She understands that despite being a white man’s child in a black man’s skin (D. Johnson 1), the New Negro will never be included. The New Negro will always succumb to the pull of gravity on the arch of a rainbow; that is true s**t.

D. Johnson and M. Johnson introduce their personal and crucial statements about the New Negro experience during the Harlem Renaissance. Both New Negro women are using Opportunity to highlight and focus their voices on their experiences in a society that did not have them in mind. Both New Negro women are inflating that the integration of the audience and writers in Opportunity to highlight the issues the New Negro face is an act ludicrous. They create puzzles through their poems to further emphasize the dark humor in expecting the white audience to understand the New Negro experience through Opportunity. They make a good joke. And as one knows, a good joke contains true s**t!

Johnson, Helene M. “My Race.” By Helene M Johnson – Famous Poems, Famous Poets. – All Poetry, 1930, https://allpoetry.com/My-Race.

Lindley, Robin. “Poor Whites and Slavery in the Antebellum South: An Interview with Historian Keri Leigh Merritt.” History News Network, 2017, https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/167224.

Johnson, Charles S. “Opportunity: A Journal of Negro Life.” Encyclopedia of Black Studies, 2005, https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412952538.n200. Published by National Urban League

Johnson, Georgia Douglas. “The Riddle.” African American Registry, 1930, https://aaregistry.org/poem/the-riddle-by-geogia-douglas-johnson/.

Lamb, Nick. “Georgia Douglas Johnson.” Medium, Medium, 30 Mar. 2017, https://medium.com/@njacoblamb/georgia-douglas-johnson-4468ba21729b.

Crisis, W.E.B. Du Bois

Blog 1

The Crisis was a very educated magazine that was used as a recruiting tool for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. This magazine has had an impact and was very popular and was mainly concentrated on African American history, politics, culture, social injustice, and their rights. The implications of “the New Negro “ is the Crisis Magazine on having a voice for African Americans to speak their truths and facts to educate other people. This magazine also tries to have a voice for African Americans to expand and increase their culture and to gain respect and to advocate for their rights. This can also help to open opportunities for their future. In the United States, African Americans were not acknowledged by the public and were not treated well.  According to Donal Harris  “However, in 1910 another kind of magazine, the African American monthly, specifically The Crisis, emerged with the conscious desire to reshape the style, size, and color of commercial periodicals as well as the implicit race of the people who read and wrote them.” (pg 62). This quote determines on how The Crisis Magazine had a representation for African Americans and can reshape people’s opinions on African Americans. These covers of the Crisis Magazine show the experience of how African Americans had issues with racial stereotypes and racial discrimination and try to correct the stereotypes. These covers were supposed to be the new representation of the New Black America. The purpose of these covers was to overcome the stereotypes of African Americans. These covers also show and determine on how it was moving, how they showed African American accomplishments, and how they influenced. According to Donal Harris “…The Crisis becomes quite clear here: first, it wants to aggregate information on African American achievements and circulate them to a national reading public so as to provide a counterhistory to racist mass culture..” (pg 69). This quote determines on how The Crisis Magazine wants to show information on African Americans’ achievements and accomplishments to educate people because other news articles were mentioning African American achievements due to racism.

These covers of The Crisis Magazine are for readers in the world and African Americans as it helps them not only change the image of  African Americans in the public eye. As well as help combat the narrative of the stereotypical and racism that was going on. The covers are for African American descents can use the cover of crisis as a visual representation of what their culture has achieved and accomplished over the years. This may survive as a guide to help pave the way against racism. Also, it’s for people who aren’t African American to gain knowledge and educate themselves about what African Americans have gone through and not pay attention to the racial stereotypes. The Crisis wasn’t just a news magazine it was a step towards equality and recognition of black achievements. Famous Colored Athlete

Crisis, Survey Graphic, W.E.B. Du Bois

Illustrations vs. Photographs of Harlem and The Crisis Culture

Between Illustrations and Photographs, there are two types of expressive art. They are both commonly alike because it shows how the artist is trying to depict and trying to tell us something about what’s going on in the art. Unlike others, some might find Illustrations and photographs not similar. I personally feel like they are both similar because you can alter a photograph to the context that you want and you can also alter an illustration because it’s more direct on what you choose to draw. These both determine that Illustrations and Photographs are very commonly alike.

 

In the book Survey Graphic Harlem Mecca of the New Negro “The Making of Harlem” by James Weldon Johnson. Harlem became a place that doesn’t necessarily have ownership because due to the culture, art, literature, and music. Harlem was only the beginning of something new that puts America’s culture into shock. This made African Americans come together in Harlem to search for a new future and new opportunities and to become themselves. They also had the same interests of progressing and getting ahead without leaving behind their customs, culture, and beliefs, developing in this way. According to James Weldon Wilson, In the Making of Harlem, it states “Harlem is indeed the great Mecca for the sight-seer, the pleasure-seeker, the curious, the adventurous, the enterprising, the ambitious and the talented of the whole Negro world; for the lure of it has reached down to every island of the Carib Sea and has penetrated even into Africa.” (Wilson, page 13). This quote determines that African Americans wanted to develop to grow and to achieve and to have ambition and talent.

The Crisis Magazine also has illustrations and photographs covers which represents African Americans trying to have a voice to expand and increase their culture and to gain respect and to advocate for their rights. Also, all of these covers are so descriptive, natural, and real which made me visualize and interpret what W.E.B Du Bois was attempting to do with these covers. Based on the Crisis Magazine what makes African Americans and Blacks American is having the freedom and independence to have their own choice and able to have opportunities for their future. For instance in the Crisis Magazine in Vol. 18, No. 1 (1919-05-01) and Vol. 17, No. 5 (1919-03-01) they show on how many African Americans entered for World War I 1 which shows loyalty and being proud, and wanting to fight for their country. Another example of what makes African Americans American is based on what they have been through. They weren’t able to have an education but now they have the freedom and choice. For example in the Crisis Magazine in this shows and represents in the cover that African Americans are wanting to have an education and a career for their future.

 

 In this photograph, it was in Harlem which is showing that many people are taking the train and the majority are African Americans. Compared to now in Harlem, there’s way more diversity, not just African Americans. 

 

 

Both of these different types of creative and expressive art which are illustrations and photographs are both very similar because it determines on how the artist sees from a different perspective and show us the meaning of the art. Some people find illustrations and photographs different although I personally disagree. Based on these photographs and illustrations that I have chosen you could see that the artist wanted to show a deeper meaning, and tell us a background story about it. This determines why illustrations and photographs are similar.

 

 

Crisis, The Opportunity, W.E.B. Du Bois

Fighting for New Identity in the Social Progress during the Harlem Renaissance

The progress of African Americans during the Harlem Renaissance was changing in the “Social Progress” in the Opportunity Magazine. African Americans have been achieving and succeeding with art, music, writing, and education. Around this time African Americans have been acknowledged and received recognition to expand and increase their culture and to gain respect and to advocate for their rights. This can also help to open opportunities for their future. Many of the people that have succeeded and received recognition for example novelists such as Carl Van Vechtim and Otto K. Khan; chairman of the Board Directors of the Metropolitan Opera Company. Most African Americans that have achieved it were also by having an education and preparation and have careers which were Gwendolyn B. Bennett, Senator Adelbert H. Roberts, and R. Maurice Moss. Gwendolyn B. Bennett assisted  Pratt Institute- Brooklyn, Columbia University, and among other universities for Art. According to the Social Progress, it claims “Miss Bennett’s artwork while at Pratt Institute attracted considerable attention, and some of her drawings have appeared as covers and illustrations in the Crisis and Messenger. Her poetry has equalled her art. One of her poems appears in the current issue of OPPORTUNITY.”( page 62). Gwendolyn B. Bennett is one of the most successful African American women that has worked for the Crisis Magazine and Opportunity Magazine. Also, her artworks and poems she wrote were both published in the Crisis Magazine and Opportunity Magazine. One of the cover arts that Gwendolyn B. Bennett made and was published in the Crisis Magazine was called “The Crisis Christmas Number” in 1923. Also some of her poems that were published as well from Opportunity Magazine and Crisis Magazine that were called  “Heritage” in The Opportunity in December 1923, “Nocturne” in the Crisis in November 1923, and “To Usward” in the Crisis and Opportunity in May 1924.  Another person that has received an education and made a career for himself is Senator Adelbert H. Roberts, who graduated from Northwestern University Law School and was the first African American to be elected as a senator in Chicago.  R. Maurice Moss also made a career but to help others. According to “Social Progress” it states “Mr. Moss is a graduate of Columbia University and has spent a year at the New York School of Social Work. His experience includes boys’ and athletic direction in community service and Y. M. C. A. work, and surveys of the Negro population in several communities.”( page 62). Based on the reading, the “Social Progress” in the Opportunity Magazine determines on how African Americans have succeeded,  accomplished, and made a better future for themselves.

 

Although Social Progress showed many positive notes on how African Americans have many accomplishments. After having suffered discrimination in schools because of the color of their skin, factions since they were children, they forged a better future for their new generations with much sacrifice, perseverance, and better opportunities for education. According to Preliminary Observations in a Study of Negro-White Crossing by Melville J. Herskovits it states “The population of Harlem, as has been mentioned, where the school in which the boys were measured is situated, is of great known mixture, —thus, of the adults from whom genealogies were obtained only two claimed to be full blooded Negroes.” (Herskovits, page 72).  The children were being measured based on their weight, height, head size, face features especially nostrils and lips. For example, in Preliminary Observations in a Study of Negro-White Crossing by Melville J. Herskovits it demonstrates “Narrow lips, thin nostrils— (NT) -31 Broad lips, thin nostrils— ( BT ) -25 Narrow lips, wide nostrils— (NW ).— 25 Broad lips, wide nostrils— (BW ) -35” (Herskovits, page 72).  This reading determines on how Preliminary Observations in a Study of Negro-White Crossing in the Opportunity magazine shows how African Americans were being discriminated against based on their facial features, the color of skin, and body.  In the reading “The Preliminary Observations in a Study of Negro-White Crossing” by Melville J. Herskovits speaking about the color of skin, facial features, and segregation can connect with “Printing the Color Line in The Crisis” from American Modernism in Big Magazines” by Donal Harris because Du Bios talks about this certain cover Art in the Crisis called “Woman of Santa Lucia”. While looking at this cover art you would think it would be a good representation of African Americans to the public but in reality, African Americans feel that it isn’t the right representation of them. According to “Printing the Color Line in The Crisis” from American Modernism in Big Magazines by Donal Harris” by Donal Harris states “In the 1920 Crisis article “In Black,” he writes, “Colored folk, like all folk, love to see themselves in pictures, but they are afraid to see the types which the white world has caricatured.”( Harris, page 82). This quote determines that African Americans didn’t want African Americans that were “too black” because they wanted new forms of representation and they also didn’t want to be seen as the racial stereotypes.

 

Based on these passages in the Opportunity Magazine, Crisis Magazine, and Printing the Color Line in The Crisis” from American Modernism in Big Magazines they showed how African Americans have struggled and have been through racial discrimination. Over the years, African Americans overcame this to have a better education, career, have a future for themselves, and want better opportunities.

 

1910 — 1922
                 Vol. 19, No. 3

                            The Opportunity: Social Progress

 

The Crisis, (1923), cover art

 

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

The crisis (1923). Pratt Institute. (n.d.). Retrieved March 9, 2022, from https://www.pratt.edu/the-work/gallery/the-crisis-1923/

Wikimedia Foundation. (2021, December 29). Gwendolyn B. Bennett. Wikipedia. Retrieved March 9, 2022, from https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwendolyn_B._Bennett

https://modjourn.org/issue/bdr512704/ 

https://books.google.com/books?id=JcgZAAAAIAAJ

https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.7312/harr17772.6

Uncategorized

WELCOME

Hello and welcome to my blog on Black Cultural Infancy and Intra-racial Conflict

Here you will see my interpretations on the emergence of Black Culture

after the Reconstruction era