Blog Entry #3- Harlem Renaissance Provocation and Connections

  From my experience during the Harlem Renaissance provocation, I have noticed many, major themes throughout the time period. These include poverty, crime, disparity in social situations, but also hope, community, and feminism. I will now discuss these major themes in this blog post.

  In my opinion, community was the most present, major theme from the provocation. As the power point presentation explained, “Community was the glue that held everything together” (Slide 9). This is why, in the example of Luke Cage (An African American superhero from the Marvel series Luke Cage), he reflects this idea of people helping each other. The police in the series are often trying to stop Luke Cage, most likely because they don't trust him. This may be a symbolic feature of the series, to show that African Americans are often misrepresented and unlawfully arrested by the police.

  This analysis brings me onto my next point, which is the Harlem Riot of 1935. In this event, an African American teen was caught shoplifting. The shop owner then threatened the teen, and soon, police, along with a crowd of “10,000 people” (Slide 11) arrived. The cops released the teen, without informing the crowd, so they assumed that they had beaten the teen. What ensued was a violent riot, in which “3 people died, (and) 125 (were) arrested.” (Slide 12)

  The Mayor of New York, Fiorello La Guardia, told a commission to investigate why the riot happened. What they discovered, and published in “The Negro in Harlem: A Report on Social and Economical Conditions Responsible for the Outbreak of March 19, 1935,” was that African Americans were struggling to educate their children, unable to find work due to racial discrimination, and that they were unable to trust police. This follows the major theme of racism, which I believe is very present in the time period of the Harlem Renaissance.

  One could make comparisons between this provocation and the poem “Smoke, Lilies and Jade.” For example, Alex, the main character of the poem, is obviously in poverty. This can be inferred from the line “why wasn't he worried that he had no money ... he had had five cents . . . but he had been hungry . . . he was hungry and still(...)”(1) Arguments could be made that his poverty is a result of racism, but that cannot be known for sure, as the story is fictional.