THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENTMusician: Pete Seeger
Seeger sang "Take it from Dr. King," which is a song about Martin Luther King Jr. leading peaceful bus boycotts and about how each and every person can join the effort and help with the battle for black Civil Rights. The song ties into the period by showing the great effort put forth by leaders to gain help in their situation in fighting for Civil Rights.

Artist: Joe Overstreet
Joe Overstreet published a piece of artwork called New Jemima that pictures a black woman holding a gun and shooting it at the world. It shows that the new way that white people depicted blacks were that they were trying to ruin the world with their fight for Civil Rights. It embodies the time period because many white people were against black Civil Rights and saw blacks as a threat to their own world.
Writer: James Baldwin
James Baldwin wrote Go Tell it on the Mountain which was a coming of age story which reflected the confines that society had on a young black man. The novel portrayed the Civil Rights Movement because people were finally waking up and realizing, just like someone does when they come of age, that there needed to be a change and they were trying to find that change within a restricting community.

THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE



Musician: Louis Armstrong
Louis Armstrong sang "What a Wonderful World". The piece talks about all the wonderful aspects of the world and points out minute details that most people wouldn't pick up on to be beautiful. The Harlem Renaissance partly took place during the Depression and Armstrong was trying to raise the spirit of the people. The piece embodies the time period in the fact that many songs and pieces of art were upbeat and happy in order to change the mood that surrounded America.

Artist: William H. Johnson
William H. Johnson's piece of artwork, The Chain Gang, depicts three black men that look tired and are holding agricultural tools. The three men are also wearing prison uniforms and chains. Many artists including Johnson used the art presented in the Harlem Renaissance to depict the past sufferings of the African American race.

Male Writer: Richard Wright
Richard Wright wrote the book Black Boy which was an autobiography published in 1937. The story tells about his harsh childhood and early adulthood in the South in the 1910's and 1920's. The book allows readers an insight into the world of a poor, unequally treated black boy and raises awareness of the social injustices that he, and other black children, must face daily.

Female Writer: Zora Neale Hurston
Zora Neale Hurston is most widely known for her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God. In this book a young woman goes through many romances in order to find herself and figure out what love is all about. She ends up leaving every man because she feels that he is not making her happy and that she could find better. The book reflects the time period because blacks at the time were trying to find their own independence from whites and also find better times ahead.

About the Elements and Artists of the Civil Rights Movement

The most important element of the Civil Rights Movement was to create equality between blacks and whites in the United States. The Civil Rights Movement had two specific elements or phases. The first was a peace element in which blacks and their supporting whites worked for equality through peace, such as Martin Luther King Jr. who used the support of black churches and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. These activists and organizations worked in the public around citizens to help raise awareness and change public interest toward a change in the treatment of blacks. The NAACP and the SNLC worked to peacefully end segregation in the courts and legislation instead of the general public. Another element of the Civil Rights Movement was the radical element. People from organizations such as the Black Panthers and the SNCC eventually were getting killed and people lost faith in the peaceful movement and resulted to a blame game. One of the most prominent leaders of this was Malcolm X who spoke about creating an all black state and criticizing capitalism. They also kicked whites out of their union groups to become all black groups. Due to this radical element, the Civil Rights Movement became a fight for Civil Rights and gained much needed attention which pushed the issue forward. For artists, the period represented a huge struggle against the odds for equality and desegregation.

About the Elements and Artists of the Harlem Renaissance

The most important element of the Harlem Renaissance was to bring attention and recognition to the city of Harlem and the African Americans who inhabited it in a time where they were fighting for Civil Rights. Another element was to show the rest of the nation the suffering that African Americans had gone through to get where they were that day. For the artists, this period gave the minorities a way to establish their own culture and to show the rest of the world their way of life. They analyzed the past and present struggles of African Americans and tried to portray that in their art.