The Harlem Renaissance

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The Harlem Renaissance movement spanned from the 1920s to the mid-1930s. This era would focus on redefining Black identity and fighting against societal norms through artistic expression in the North. During this time many African Americans would come together to create art using various forms and literature would be one of the primary forms seen as one of the more influential ones in that era. Artists created works that would touch on topics that the Renaissance was all about and even though we think of famous writers like Langston or Zora first when thinking about the literary impact during the Harlem Renaissance we have artists like Claude McKay, Georgia Douglas Jackson, and James Weldon Johnson who were also able to highlight the themes …show more content…
After these events passed, a writer would step forward to create a poem inspired by what happened in the mid-1919s. Claude McKay was born on September 15, 1889, and died on May 22, 1948. He would create a poem, If We Must Die, published in July 1919. If We Must Die is a “Shakespearean sonnet written as a response to the Red Summer of 1919” (Royles). It was a message to stop these unfair killings of African Americans and encourage them to fight for their lives and by coming together they could be successful. The theme of this poem is political resistance and ties into what the Harlem Renaissance was all about, redefining the Black experience because the poem itself ties into the start of Black people starting to speak up and not allowing themselves to be killed off like animals like before. Self-expression was a big thing during the movement, coming in various emotions like sadness, happiness, anger, and others and in this poem, you can feel the urgency, hope, and anger through his words which is why this work highlights that theme of the movement so …show more content…
It would continue to still be inspirational in music form to the point where NAACP would adopt the song and call it “Negro National Anthem” in 1919 (Miller). With this, it became popular during the movement as it would continue to inspire activists and artists during the Harlem Renaissance. I see Lift Every Voice and Sing as impactful for the Renaissance because it would show what the movement stood for and be able to give voice to the artists who would step up and create the moving works during that era that we look up to today. The Harlem Renaissance is an important moment in history for not just African Americans but for Black art because the movement created a platform for Black people to express themselves through many mediums and it would give room to artists like Claude McKay, Georgia Douglas Jackson, and James Weldon Johnson who would be able to highlight themes of the Harlem Renaissance through their works by confronting injustice African Americans faced, discovering identity, and advocating racial
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