African American writers

The Philadelphia Negro is a study of society among African American people in Philadelphia written by W.E.B Du Bois and published in 1899 by the University of Pennsylvania Press. It is the first sociological case study of the black community. Du Bois, the author of the Philadelphia Negro was a great African American writer, sociologist, teacher, and protest leader. He was born in 1868 in Massachusetts and died in 1963 at age 95. However, Du Bois’s great works remain forever. He live in Great…

• When you hear the word African American, a lot of people will tell you they are mostly in gangs and that they started a civil rights movements, where hunted by whites and killed by whites. The word police officer you think of white males who attack African Americans but if I tell you that a cop died in September 1, 1944 from letting a bunch of kids into sneaking into the game. They came back with a rifle and shot him with a .22 caliber rifle in the throat, you might laugh and say “Why…

deserved after years of oppression. As goals for integration into American life pushed on, as did the number of people who wanted to involve themselves in the social movement (50). This push towards a new attitude for equal treatment of blacks was not a simple task for various activist groups like the NAACP to take on, especially during the rise of television. As discussed in Thomas Cripps article, “Amos ‘n’ Andy and the Debate Over American Racial Integration,” the program, Amos ‘N’ Andy,…

and city jobs which displaced 60,000 employees greatly affected the African & African Diasporic communities of the South Bronx. With issues with housing, public services, the shrinking job opportunity due to the industrializing city, caused the Artist such as Dj Herc who learned specific trades and vocational skills to develop the means for artistic defiance and ingenuity. Hip hop became a means of expression for African Americans, from teens to adults, as a way to the cope with the hardships…

Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun centers on an African American family’s struggles during the twentieth century. In the play, the author illustrates vital issues such as poverty and gender, and racial discrimination on colored people. However, there are many other features that contribute to the play’s success, including: its two major themes (importance of family and significance of their dreams), the main character’s personality, and the author’s standpoint in the story. One of the…

Born in Joplin, Missouri, James Langston Hughes was born into an abolitionist family. At a young age, Hughes was separated from his parents and lived with his maternal grandmother who told him stories of slaves and abolitionists. Hughes was impressed by her stories, which enabled him reach into his roots. "Through my grandmother 's stories always life moved, moved heroically toward an end. Nobody ever cried in my grandmother 's stories. They worked, or schemed, or fought. But no crying," Hughes…

what it means and whom it affects. Colorism is the prejudice or discrimination against individuals with dark skin tone, typically among people of the same ethnic or racial group. When researching colorism and discrimination and how it affects African Americans there has to be a division between their perception and the reality of the situation. In some situations many people mix the understanding of the two together there is also making sure the target of people being questioned is well…

many of our ideas and opinions can be stereotyped or prejudiced, bearing no relationship to the truth” (ch.5, p.254). Learning to Read and Write This reading by Fredrick Douglas on his experience to read and write shows great commitment by an African American during a time of slavery. Douglas was a slave that whose duties were to work and obey, not read and write. But, he felt a strong urge to be educated thus leading him on a search to find white people -mainly male children- to help him read…

argument that she wants to make between skin tone and salvation. Phyllis expresses her thoughts in a very bizarre way. In some cases it can misinterpreted what she is trying to say. Although she writes in a different way she is a very talented writer. There are a few lines that expresses color in Wheatley’s poem. The lines are, “some view our sable race with scornful eye, Their colour is a diabolic die"(Wheatley, On Being Brought, 5-6). Sable is an animal that has valuable black fur,…

Zora Hurston was born in Notasulga, Alabama. This is where her father originally grew up as well as her grandfather. At the age of three is when her and her family had moved to Eatonville , Florida; this is one of the first all African American towns where Zora really felt at home. In fact her father was elected mayor in 1897 and he also was a preacher at Macedonia missionary baptist. Zora felt she could have independence of white society here. While in school some northern teacher…