Transcript African-American Histroy

African-American
History
Literature from an Historical
Perspective
ORAL TRADITION
1619-1808
ORAL TRADITION

Work Songs
We are going down to Georgia, boys
To see the pretty girls, boys;
We’ll give ‘em a pint of brandy, boys
And a hearty kiss, besides, boys.

Spirituals
Joshua fit de battle of Jericho,
Jericho, Jericho,
Joshua fit the battle of Jericho,
And de walls come tumbling town.
1619-1808
Oral Tradition
Folktales--Africa
The Elephant and the Tortoise
 Slave Folktales
Rabbit Teaches Bear a Song

Oral Tradition
Phillis Wheatley (1770’s)
‘Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land,
Taught my benighted soul to understand
That there’s a God, that there’s a Savior too:
Once I redemption neither sought nor knew.
Some view our sable race with scornful eye,
“Their colour is diabolic die.”
Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,
May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train.

ABOLITIONISTS
1808-1865
ABOLITIONISTS
1808-1865
Olaudah Equiano (1745-1797)
“One day, when we had a smooth sea and
moderate wind, two of my wearied countrymen
who were chained together, preferring death to
such a life of misery, somehow made through
the netting and jumped into the sea;…Many a
time we were near suffocation from the want of
fresh air, which we were often without for whole
days together.”

Slave Narratives

Sojourner Truth (1779-?)
– “Ain’t I A Woman?”

Frederick Douglas (1817-1895)
– Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

Harriet A. Jacobs (1813-1897)
– Incidents in the Life of a Salve Girl, Written by
Herself

William Wells Brown (1815-1884)
– Clotel: The President’s Daughter, A Narrative of Slave
Life in the United States
POST CIVIL WAR
1865-1915
POST CIVIL WAR

1865-1915
Charles Chesnutt (1858-1932)
– The Goophered Grapevine

Paul Dunbar (1872-1906)
– We Wear the Mask

Booker T. Washington (1856-1915)
– Up From Slavery

W.E. Du Bois (1868-1963)
– The Souls of Black Folks
We Wear the Mask
WE wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our
eyes,—
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.
We Wear the Mask
Why should the world be over-wise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us, while
We wear the mask.
 We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from tortured souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
We wear the mask!

RENAISANNCE
1915-1945
RENAISANNCE 1915-1945

Marcus Garvey (1887-1940)
– Speech on Disarmament Conference

Claude McKay (1889-1948)
– If We Must Die

Langston Hughes (1902-1967)
– Harlem

Gwendolyn Bennett (1902-1981)
– Heritage

Richard Wright (1908-1960)
– Black Boy
Harlem

What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?
PRE-CIVIL RIGHTS
1945-1960
PRE-CIVIL RIGHTS

Margaret Walker (1915-)
– For My People

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-)
– We Real Cool

Lorraine Hansberry (1930-1965)
– A Raisin in the Sun

Ralph Ellison (1914-1994)
– Invisible Man

James Baldwin (1924-1987)
– Sonny’s Blues
1945-1960
CIVIL RIGHTS TO NOW
1960 to Present
CIVIL RIGHTS TO NOW
1960 to Present




Malcolm X (1925-1965)
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968)
Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (1950-)
Maya Angelou (1928-)
– I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Toni Morrison (1931-)
– The Bluest Eyes

Alice Walker (1944-)
– Everyday Use

Terry McMillan (1951-)
– How Stella God Her Groove Back