Anja Werner
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781628461558
- eISBN:
- 9781626740839
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781628461558.003.0006
- Subject:
- History, African-American History
In “Convenient Partnerships? African American Civil Rights Leaders and the East German Dictatorship,” Anja Werner discusses another unlikely ideological alliance, this time between Civil Rights and ...
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In “Convenient Partnerships? African American Civil Rights Leaders and the East German Dictatorship,” Anja Werner discusses another unlikely ideological alliance, this time between Civil Rights and Black Power activists in the US on the one hand and East German political leaders on the other. Since the 1980s, there has been a vivid scholarly interest in the subject of Black Germany and connecting points between Civil Rights activism of African Americans and both West and East Germans. However since the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, there has been renewed interest in African American activists interaction with the communist East German dictatorship. This paper traces W.E.B. Du Bois, Paul and Eslanda Robeson, Angela Davis, and Martin Luther King Jr. during visits in the communist German Democratic Republic (GDR) mainly between 1959 and 1981. It juxtaposes a close reading of the Black leaders’ motives with the goals and expectations of the East German dictatorship, revealing that both sides used the media attention that their contacts garnered to further their respective agendas. For African Americans—rather than allowing themselves to be used by the communist cause—it meant to draw international attention to the American race problem and thus to pressure the US government during the Cold War. For the East German communists, it was meant to boost their standing in the Western world at a time when the GDR was striving for international recognition beyond the Eastern Bloc. However, while the GDR dictatorship attempted to control African Americans’ perception among the East German population, they ultimately failed on account of the force of the Black freedom fight, revealing deeply rooted underlying racism, and thus, belying the claim that the communist bloc had been more successful in uprooting it.Less
In “Convenient Partnerships? African American Civil Rights Leaders and the East German Dictatorship,” Anja Werner discusses another unlikely ideological alliance, this time between Civil Rights and Black Power activists in the US on the one hand and East German political leaders on the other. Since the 1980s, there has been a vivid scholarly interest in the subject of Black Germany and connecting points between Civil Rights activism of African Americans and both West and East Germans. However since the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, there has been renewed interest in African American activists interaction with the communist East German dictatorship. This paper traces W.E.B. Du Bois, Paul and Eslanda Robeson, Angela Davis, and Martin Luther King Jr. during visits in the communist German Democratic Republic (GDR) mainly between 1959 and 1981. It juxtaposes a close reading of the Black leaders’ motives with the goals and expectations of the East German dictatorship, revealing that both sides used the media attention that their contacts garnered to further their respective agendas. For African Americans—rather than allowing themselves to be used by the communist cause—it meant to draw international attention to the American race problem and thus to pressure the US government during the Cold War. For the East German communists, it was meant to boost their standing in the Western world at a time when the GDR was striving for international recognition beyond the Eastern Bloc. However, while the GDR dictatorship attempted to control African Americans’ perception among the East German population, they ultimately failed on account of the force of the Black freedom fight, revealing deeply rooted underlying racism, and thus, belying the claim that the communist bloc had been more successful in uprooting it.
Gene Andrew Jarrett
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814743386
- eISBN:
- 9780814743874
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814743386.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Cultural Studies
The political value of African American literature has long been a topic of great debate among American writers, both black and white, from Thomas Jefferson to Barack Obama. This book traces the ...
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The political value of African American literature has long been a topic of great debate among American writers, both black and white, from Thomas Jefferson to Barack Obama. This book traces the genealogy of this topic in order to develop an innovative political history of African American literature. It examines texts of every sort to parse the myths of authenticity, popular culture, nationalism, and militancy that have come to define African American political activism in recent decades. The book argues that unless we show the diverse and complex ways that African American literature has transformed society, political myths will continue to limit our understanding of this intellectual tradition. Cultural forums ranging from the printing press, schools, and conventions, to parlors, railroad cars, and courtrooms provide the backdrop to this African American literary history, while the foreground is replete with compelling stories, from the debate over racial genius in early American history and the intellectual culture of racial politics after slavery, to the tension between copyright law and free speech in contemporary African American culture, to the political audacity of Barack Obama's creative writing. This book is a bold explanation of what's at stake in continuing to politicize African American literature in the new millennium.Less
The political value of African American literature has long been a topic of great debate among American writers, both black and white, from Thomas Jefferson to Barack Obama. This book traces the genealogy of this topic in order to develop an innovative political history of African American literature. It examines texts of every sort to parse the myths of authenticity, popular culture, nationalism, and militancy that have come to define African American political activism in recent decades. The book argues that unless we show the diverse and complex ways that African American literature has transformed society, political myths will continue to limit our understanding of this intellectual tradition. Cultural forums ranging from the printing press, schools, and conventions, to parlors, railroad cars, and courtrooms provide the backdrop to this African American literary history, while the foreground is replete with compelling stories, from the debate over racial genius in early American history and the intellectual culture of racial politics after slavery, to the tension between copyright law and free speech in contemporary African American culture, to the political audacity of Barack Obama's creative writing. This book is a bold explanation of what's at stake in continuing to politicize African American literature in the new millennium.
Elizabeth Schroeder Schlabach
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252037825
- eISBN:
- 9780252095108
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252037825.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, American, 20th Century Literature
This book examines the flowering of African American creativity, activism, and scholarship in the South Side Chicago district known as Bronzeville during the period between the Harlem Renaissance in ...
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This book examines the flowering of African American creativity, activism, and scholarship in the South Side Chicago district known as Bronzeville during the period between the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s and the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s. Poverty stricken, segregated, and bursting at the seams with migrants, Bronzeville was the community that provided inspiration, training, and work for an entire generation of diversely talented African American authors and artists who came of age during the years between the two world wars. This book investigates the institutions and streetscapes of Black Chicago that fueled an entire literary and artistic movement. It argues that African American authors and artists—such as Gwendolyn Brooks, Richard Wright, Langston Hughes, painter Archibald Motley, and many others—viewed and presented black reality from a specific geographic vantage point: the view along the streets of Bronzeville. The book explores how the particular rhythms and scenes of daily life in Bronzeville locations, such as the State Street “Stroll” district or the bustling intersection of 47th Street and South Parkway, figured into the creative works and experiences of the artists and writers of the Black Chicago Renaissance.Less
This book examines the flowering of African American creativity, activism, and scholarship in the South Side Chicago district known as Bronzeville during the period between the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s and the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s. Poverty stricken, segregated, and bursting at the seams with migrants, Bronzeville was the community that provided inspiration, training, and work for an entire generation of diversely talented African American authors and artists who came of age during the years between the two world wars. This book investigates the institutions and streetscapes of Black Chicago that fueled an entire literary and artistic movement. It argues that African American authors and artists—such as Gwendolyn Brooks, Richard Wright, Langston Hughes, painter Archibald Motley, and many others—viewed and presented black reality from a specific geographic vantage point: the view along the streets of Bronzeville. The book explores how the particular rhythms and scenes of daily life in Bronzeville locations, such as the State Street “Stroll” district or the bustling intersection of 47th Street and South Parkway, figured into the creative works and experiences of the artists and writers of the Black Chicago Renaissance.
Susan Prothro Wright
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- March 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781604734164
- eISBN:
- 9781621036050
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781604734164.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, African-American Literature
This chapter puts forward the hypothesis that Charles Chesnutt attempted to publish his novel Paul Marchand, F.M.C. in 1921, with the goal of countering D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation. ...
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This chapter puts forward the hypothesis that Charles Chesnutt attempted to publish his novel Paul Marchand, F.M.C. in 1921, with the goal of countering D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation. Substantiating this hypothesis not only helps to answer questions about Chesnutt’s decision to submit a novel for publication so long after the publication of his final ill-fated novel, The Colonel’s Dream but also reveals the novel’s potential as a feasible challenge to Birth’s depictions of both white and black characters. In relation to this, it is important to note that Chesnutt’s political and literary activities parallel African-American activism during the racially turbulent political climate from 1906 until 1921, the year Chesnutt submitted Paul Marchand for publication.Less
This chapter puts forward the hypothesis that Charles Chesnutt attempted to publish his novel Paul Marchand, F.M.C. in 1921, with the goal of countering D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation. Substantiating this hypothesis not only helps to answer questions about Chesnutt’s decision to submit a novel for publication so long after the publication of his final ill-fated novel, The Colonel’s Dream but also reveals the novel’s potential as a feasible challenge to Birth’s depictions of both white and black characters. In relation to this, it is important to note that Chesnutt’s political and literary activities parallel African-American activism during the racially turbulent political climate from 1906 until 1921, the year Chesnutt submitted Paul Marchand for publication.
