The Harlem Renaissance saw the rise of art influenced by a proud and growing culture of African Americans despite pushback from their Euro-American counterparts. It was an era meant to interpret what the identity of African Americans meant in both a societal and personal way. Beliefs were questioned as were concepts of what it meant to be Black in a land economically dominated by White Americans. The Harlem Renaissance was a defining moment for African American society on both a personal and societal level. The term itself is its own direct example of the tension between the origins of the Americas’ kidnapped population and the forced indoctrination of those same people. To say Africans were uprooted is only a percentage of the damage done to African American people during the period of slavery. Heads were shaved, languages were beaten off confused tongues, religions, and traditional rituals were banned, Countee Cullen’s “heathen gods” were replaced with an unfamiliar being who not only was said to accept their suffering but to almost get the same joy out of it as their kidnappers.
Personal identity was a complicated topic for many African Americans. The biggest question was ‘Can someone stake a claim to a heritage that was stolen from them?’ Poems such as Countee Cullen’s “Heritage” took on this concept with incredible gusto. “Heritage” is a work that looks at what both the term African and place Africa really mean to the descendants of its stolen people. The cultures of many tribes over time were lost or transitioned. Religious beliefs changed, sometimes being lost forever, or in rare cases of faiths such as the Yoruba tradition were protected by transitioning important idol names into the names of Christian or Catholic figures. “Heritage” looks at the internal struggle of an African American man between religious beliefs that detail his own personal connection to slavery, and those of his ancestors. His dilemma is not just a racial one but a spiritual one. At first glance, the man idolizes his concept of African culture and what he views as his original roots. Later in the poem, the man's own biases take hold, and he thinks on the faiths of his ancestors and comes to a crossroads. Should he respect his ancestor's beliefs, or should he keep the system beaten into them by White society? The beauty in the work ends up being the man's decision to choose neither side, but instead, forge a path for himself in a grand theme of rebirth. He recognizes that he still needs to keep the pride he has in his family line, but at the same time accepts that his beliefs are his own and, in a way, this is how he is reclaiming his path as an African American. No longer is his philosophy dictated by White society's stereotypes, but by his own decisions. He is also not held by idolized concepts of his ancestral roots. There is a certain strength in the man's ability to look at the societal ideal and compare it to a cultural ideal in a non-biased way, enough so that rather than chose one or the other he is able to keep both his cultural pride without sacrificing his personal beliefs.
With a new definition for the identity that is ‘African American,’ also came a new question for this group's culture and society. Short works, long poems, books, and essays of the time addressed a battle between two distinct ideas. The first idea was for Black Americans to appease their White counterparts through a muted existence. Many African Americans felt that the way to a successful society and coexistence was through following the directives of mainstream White society. It is admirable to attempt a peaceful coexistence, however, the other primary concept for early African American society argues ‘At what cost?’ Many people had grown tired of violent persecution from their White counterparts, but even more, were tired of living in a country built on the backs of many of their ancestors with nothing to show for it.
The biggest protest against a muted society was that of historical background. Even today, one of the biggest steps educators can take in reinforcing pride in their students is from telling the whole history, instead of one that starts with slavery. The history of the Black American community is filled with despair but poems such as “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” by Langston Hughes implore readers to focus on a bigger picture to aid a new society. This particular short work speaks of the physical traveling history of Black society. By reminding readers that their roots start on the banks of the Congo, the Euphrates, or the Nile Hughes is able to ease pain in his community that stems from an intense rewriting of Black history by White counterparts with more control over the narrative.
Hughes uses his writing to remind Black people that their history starts before slavery and that is something to be proud of. Even more than the lands of their origins, he encourages readers to take pride in the lands they see before them today. Of course, the Mississippi is nothing like the Nile, and to many African Americans, there are only a few American landscapes that can begin to compare to African visions of nature, but the whole concept of a lineage connected to people whose strength showed in one of America's most dangerous times for Black people creates a feeling of pride in their lineage and all the possibilities for future African Americans.
African Americans were faced with the incredible challenge of defining what their identities would be for themselves rather than following along with the initial stereotyping of their White counterparts. As a unified society, Black Americans strove to utterly dismantle the past minstrel show depictions of them created by White society. A conscious movement towards an evolution of the imagery of African Americans took place as this population of people realized an immense potential for exploration in every sense of the word. When authors like Alain Locke talked about the new over the old vision of African Americans, they defined the difference between the two kinds of psychologies. On the side of the “old negro” there is an image of an adult who is still childlike in their ignorance. This concept of the old version of the friendly neighborhood African American revolved around the assumption of that person's perceived stupidity. The old African American was a figure to be pitied and helped but kept naive.
The ‘new negro’ was intelligent, but not just that, they were people who more than anything else knew they were worth more to society than what was reflected in their treatment. The new society of Black Americans was artistic, creating new forms of visual art and perfecting a whole genre of music. Literary icons created a new type of written work, one that catered to Black America and its personal struggles. While the stories of White America reminisced on the privileges granted to that portion of society by the demanding work of forced labor, the poems of Black America gave thanks for the survival of their ancestors. Survival sounds like a simple gift, but that perseverance in the face of horrendous acts would eventually allow their descendants to become more than just free from physical chains, but also from the mental shackles created by decades of generational trauma stemming from the actions and attitudes of White America towards its Black counterpart.
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