Cultural Contributions of the 1920s

The 1920s saw a great explosion and a growing awareness of African American culture literary, musically, and artistically. Northern cities, such as Harlem, provided a safe place for the growth and exposure of many talented African Americans. Even though the cultural movement, known as the Harlem Renaissance, began in Harlem, New York it spread throughout the nation and beyond. This great wealth of artistic talent might not have been possible without the movement of many African Americans to northern cities during the early 1900s, in order to find better jobs and escape discrimination. However, African Americans werent the only ones making cultural contributions to the fabric of the United States during the 1920s; many other Americans were adding their own influences.

Directions: In your own words complete the following chart using your textbook, online or otherwise, and the internet. Cultural Contributors (add pictures here) Art, Music, or Literature Specific Contribution and Motivation (at least 3 sentences and give examples of their work) Langston Hughes was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist. He is best known as a leader of the Harlem renaissance. Hughes became a famous writer, but all his life he remembered how he started out, and he helped and encouraged many other struggling writers. Ex: Not without laughter, The ways of white folks

LANGSTON HUGHES

Literature

DUKE ELLINGTON

music

Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist and bandleader of jazz orchestras. He won a Grammy lifetime achievement award. At the age of 7, he began studying piano and earned the nickname "Duke" for his gentlemanly ways. EX: In A Sentimental Mood, The Feeling Of Jazz

LOUIS ARMSTRONG

Music

Louis Armstrong, nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American jazz trumpeter and singer from New Orleans, Louisiana. He was also skilled at scat singing. On New Year's Eve in 1912, Armstrong fired his stepfather's gun in the air during a New Year's Eve celebration and was arrested on the spot. EX: Hello, dolly!, what a wonderful world

BESSIE SMITH

music

Bessie Smith was an American blues singer. Nicknamed The Empress of the Blues, Smith was the most popular female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s. By the end of the 1920s, however, her career suffered from both the Depression and her battle with alcoholism. EX: Nobody knows when your down and out, St Louis Blues

JACOB LAWRENCE

Art

Jacob Lawrence was an American painter known for his portrayal of African-American life. In 1937, Lawrence won a scholarship to the American Artists School in New York. At the outbreak of World War II, Lawrence was drafted into the United States Coast Guard.

EX:

GEORGIA OKEEFFE

Art

Georgia Totto O'Keeffe was an American artist. She made largeformat paintings of enlarged blossoms, presenting them close up as if seen through a magnifying lens, and New York buildings, most of which date from the same decade. O'Keeffe has been recognized as the Mother of American Modernism.

EX:
literature F. SCOTT FITZGERALD Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigmatic writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost Generation" of the 1920s.

EX: the great Gatsby, tender is the night

JOHN STEINBECK

literature

John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. Steinbeck received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men. EX: Of Mice And Men, The Grapes Of Wrath

AARON COPLAND
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/aaroncopland/about-the-composer/475/

music

Aaron Copland was an American composer, composition teacher, writer, and later in his career a conductor of his own and other American music. In addition to his ballets and orchestral works, he produced music in many other genres including chamber music, vocal works, opera and film scores. The open, slowly changing harmonies of many of his works are archetypical of what many people consider to be the sound of American music, evoking the vast American landscape and pioneer spirit.

EX: fanfare for the common man

GEORGE GERSHWIN
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/georgegershwin/about-the-composer/65/

music

George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known. Among his best known works are the orchestral compositions Rhapsody in Blue and An American in Paris, as well as the opera Porgy and Bess. Gershwin moved to Hollywood and composed numerous film scores until his death in 1937 from a brain tumor. EX: Rhapsody in blue