Transcript Seeing American History: Using Art and Historical

Seeing History:
Using Art with Historical Documents
as Teaching Tools
UCI Teacher Workshop
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Bridget R. Cooks, Ph.D.
The Harlem Renaissance
• The Great Migration (1913-1946)
• More than 400K African Americans fled
the Jim Crow South to points North and
West.
• Largest migration in American history.
• Thousands moved to Harlem, New York
• New multiethnic Black community formed
a new consciousness of what it meant to
be American.
The Harlem Renaissance
This period of new consciousness, the
formation of new art forms in music, art,
literature, poetry, performance, and
celebration of Black culture is called the
Harlem Renaissance (1919-1929).
Presentation Objectives
• Examine visual art and literature as
resources for learning about history.
• Introduce some basic visual analysis skills
such as reading composition, color, line to
“de-code” a work of art.
• Take into consideration the subject,
audience, and the author of an image to
understand different historical
perspectives.
What do you see when you look at a work of art?
How to Read an Image
1. Elements of compositionHow did the artist use color, line, and shape to make an impact
on the viewer?
2. Size- Is the work of art life size? Larger than life? Small and intimate?
Can it be viewed by only one viewer or more than one viewer at the same
time?
3. Iconography- What is the subject matter of the work of art?
4. Iconology- What are the meanings and purposes of symbols?
5. Presentation of the figure- Notice the posture, eye contact, dress, etc.
6. What is the relationship between the figure/s and environment?
7. Consider social context.
What is the time period in which it was made?
In which country was it made?
Who it was made by?
Who it was made for?
Why it was made?
How did it function in its viewing context originally (i.e. private
public viewing, mass reproduction)? How is it viewed
today?
8. What does the title of the work of art mean?
viewing,
How do we get students to talk about pictures?
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What is going on in this picture?
What do we see here?
What is the figure doing?
What feeling do you get from this picture?
What do you see that makes you feel that way?
Why do you think the figure is doing ___?
What is the relationship between the picture and
the title?
• What is the relationship between the picture and
the text? (when applicable)
• What do you think the artist wants us to think
about this person/place/event?
Do not be afraid of silence after asking a
question.
Allow students the time to answer the
question.
Unique advantages of discussing
art in the classroom:
• Great approach to group work, even for students
who usually dislike group work.
• Students’ individual perspectives can be
validated by others.
• Allows students to hear each other and see what
the other students see.
• Multiple points of view can be engaged at once.
More Advantages:
• Awareness of complexity and multiple possibilities.
• Not necessarily one right answer.
• Encourages focus. The more you look the more you
see.
• Brings history alive through a different sensory
approach. Can help visual learners understand literary
texts better.
• Tool for encouraging analysis. Can practice making an
assertion and backing it up with evidence.
11th grade: Harlem Renaissance
History- Social Sciences Content Standard:
• 11.5: Students analyze the major political,
social, economic, technological, and cultural
developments of the 1920s.
5. Describe the Harlem Renaissance and
new trends in literature, music, and art,
with special attention to the works of
writers (e.g., Zora Neale Hurston,
Langston Hughes).
Ethiopia Awakening (1914)
by Meta Fuller
New York Customs House
(now the New York Museum of the American Indian)
Africa (c.1904) by Daniel Chester French
America (c.1904)
by Daniel Chester French
Asia (c.1904)
by Daniel Chester French
Europe (c.1904) by Daniel Chester French
National American Indian Museum today
The Ascent of Ethiopia (1932)
by Lois Mailou Jones
“The New Negro” (1925)
by Alain Locke
Who is Alain Locke?
Philosopher and Author
Professor at Howard University
Author of the manifesto essay
of the Harlem Renaissance
What is a Negro?
• Term used to refer to people of African
ancestry. Used in the 20th century through
the Civil Rights Movement. The term is no
longer acceptable in contemporary
speech.
Main Points of the Essay
• New attitude and determination of African
Americans
• New interest in African American traditions
and African history
• Belief in the beauty and talents of Black
people
The Old Negro
versus
The New Negro
The Old Negro Characteristics
• Mythology of Black people as backward
• Image of stereotypes of the 19th century
(mammy, coon, sambo)
• Caricatures of Black people
• The Black person who believes these
myths about himself
The New Negro Characteristics
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Modern
Has self-respect and self-dependence
Excited about the future
Breaks from a past of subservience
Leads boldly away from the past
The Legacy of the Ancestral Arts
(1925)
by Alain Locke
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Main Points of the Essay
African Americans have rich ancestral
histories in Africa
Africans have art traditions
African art is the rightful heritage of African
Americans.
African Americans should create a distinct
art in America influenced by African art
Heritage (1925)
by Countee Cullen
Who is Countee Cullen?
 Prolific poet
 Began writing seriously
as a young student
 Taught French to junior
high school students
 Wrote about African
American life
Heritage
http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~jenglish/Courses/Spring02/104/Cullen_Heritage.htm
Main Points
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 Repeated question “What is Africa to Me?”
 Imagined exploration of his African ancestry is his
answer to the question.
 Writes of Africa as a jungle, with wild animals, and
beating drums that torment him. (Where did he
get this from?)
 Considers religious differences between Africans
and African Americans
 Torn between his African (Black) and American
(White) selves.
Heritage
• Africa a topic for daydreams.
• Can discuss with the students that African
Americans were removed from knowledge
about their past because of violence of
slavery and the distancing of time and
geographic space.
• Harlem Renaissance was an opportunity
for African Americans to try to connect
with a past of which they had no direct
experience.
The Negro Artist and the Racial
Mountain (1926)
Who is Langston Hughes?
• Poet and novelist
• Cultural critic
• Wrote about ordinary
Black people and
Black folk culture
The Negro Artist and the Racial
Mountain
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Main Points
Value of everyday people
Critical of middle class African Americans
Embraces the cultural differences between
Blacks and Whites
Encourages the right of Blacks to have full
humanity (to be beautiful and ugly too).
If We Must Die (1919)
Who is Claude McKay?
 Jamaican immigrant
 Poet at age 10
 Novelist and journalist
 Wrote about Black life,
violence, and political
injustice
If We Must Die
• Poem that addresses not going down
without a fight
• Often discussed in the context of war and
most recently in relationship to lynching
• Pride of who you are
• Not afraid to die, but unwilling to die in
vain