Student Social Action Against Racism

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Definition

What is race?

-race was originally used as we use the term “ethnicity” today

-race is a social construction, it has meaning because society and culture have given it meaning (Class notes)

-race is a social category defined on the basis of shared physical and biological characteristics (skin color, hair texture, stature, eye shape, facial features, etc.)

-race is endlessly contingent, varies widely over time and place

-modern racism is based on a concept of race developed during 19th century:

1. Differences in physical characteristics among people express different subspecies of humankind- physical difference has always existed

2. These subspecies are inherently and substantially different from one another- hierarchy, justification for more power -ex. Slavery (primarily religious literature that appear to justify slavery of Africans)

3. These subspecies are hierarchically arranged fro superior to inferior in intelligence, virtue, and other capabilities

4. Race is essential to explaining and predicting human behavior, morality, and intellectual and physical capacities (American Studies class notes)

“Racism” the belief that one’s own race is superior to others, and that members of other races should be treated differently.” (pg.xxvi, Harlem Renaissance)

History

Big movements

Harlem Renaissance

-“1890-1920 approximately two million African Americans migrate from the South to the North”

-1910 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is founded

-1917 “Between 10,000 and 15,000 African Americans join the Silent Protest Parade, marching down Fifth Avenue in complete silence to protest violence against Blacks”

-1919 “Red Summer of Hate”

Important People in the Harlem Renaissance:

Marcus Garvey- founds United Negro Improvement Association 1917

W.E.B Du Bois- prominent Black leader

Jessie Redmon Fauset- literary editor of “Crisis” 1919

James Weldon Johnson- head of NAACP 1920

Langston Hughes

Bessie Smith- “most famous blues sunger”

Duke Ellington

Jean Toomer – “wrote innovative novel Crane”

-1935 “Harlem is the scene of a major riot sparked by anger over discrimination by white-owned businesses” (pg. xx)

“Harlem Renaissance: popular name for the blossoming of African American culture- including literature, drama, music, visual arts, and journalism- that took place between the end of World War I and the beginning of the Great Depression. Also called the New Negro Movement.” (pg. xxiii) “one of the issues that had come to disturb Harlem residents was the fact that few of the many white-owned businesses in Harlem, whose profits came from black customers, hired black employees, particularly in positions of responsibility.” (pg.145)

-March 19, 1935 Lenox Avenue in Harlem

-fueled by rumors that a boy has been beaten to death

“In the end, three blacks were killed, thirty were injured, and more than one hundred were jailed; the approximately 20,000 participants had caused a two-million-dollar loss to white-owned commercial property.” (pg.145)

“But all agree that the biggest reason for the decline of the Harlem Renaissance was the dawn of the Great Depression, a period of economic downturn that caused widespread poverty and suffering for millions of Americans.” (pg.136)

“Between the years 1884 and 1990, around twenty five lynchings occurred in the South, creating a terrifying a terrifying atmosphere for African Americans” (pg.7) - one reason why so many African Americans chose to move North.

Also- the South’s economy was bad and there were many discriminatory acts against blacks which meant danger for them and were more reasons to move North (pg.8) (All above taken from Harlem Renaissance)

“When more than one hundred of the leading black and white writers, publishers, and editors of the 1920s met at New York’s Civic Club on March 21, 1934, to celebrate the publication of Jesse Fauset’s There is Confusion, it served as the dress rehearsal for the Harlem Renaissance.” (pg. 19, Rereading the Harlem Renaissance)

“…the Black Power Movement, which sought to liberate blacks from social, political, and economic oppression…” (pg.118, Rereading the Harlem Renaissance)

Another big movement…

Civil Rights Movement along with Jim Crow Laws

“Jim Crow Laws: unfair laws that, in the Southern states from the post- Civil War period to the middle of the twentieth century, were used to keep African Americans from becoming full, equal citizens (an example is the segregation of public facilities, which meant that blacks could not use the same restrooms or drinking fountains as whites).” (pg. xxiii, Harlem Renaissance)

“Many African Americans, men in particular, refused to participate in nonviolent protests because they believed that passive resistance to white violence simply reproduced the same degrading rituals of domination and submission that suffered the master/slave relationship” (pg.3, The Deacons for Defense)

“The rise of white supremacist violence in response to desegregation made self-defense a paramount goal for many local black organizing efforts” (pg. 5).

“Much of the popular history of the civil rights era rests on the myth of nonviolence: the perception that the movement achieved its goals through nonviolent direct action” (pg.5).

“The benefits of segregation constantly reinforced white loyalty to racism and violence” (pg.23).

“For most of the black men, the issue was honor, not safety” (pg.38).

“..in thousands of other small southern towns, the Civil Rights Act had done little to end Jim Crow” (pg.41).