Urbanization, the Great Migration, and the Growth of the American City (12-14)

What percentage of the country lived in urban areas in the 1920s?

50%

how did the US census define “Urban” areas?

A place with a population over 2500

What was the population of New York in 1920? By what factor was the population larger than the entire US population in 1790?

5.6 million; 1.5x

Popular literature started shifting from portraying rural AMericans to what?

portraying the lives of city-dwellers as they navigated the complicated realities of new urban lifestyle

What cities did substantial numbers of black Americans move to during the first great Migration? Why did they move?

chicago, New York Philadelphia, and detroit; to escape institutionalized discrimination of the Jim Crow Era or to work in northern industries

When did the first and second great Migration take place?

1910-40, First great Migration; 1940-70, Second great migration

How did the movement of African Americans to cultural centers like NY and Chicago help shape the national culture?

they received more attention and patronage that they had previously been denied in the South

What made the Harlem Renaissance possible?

increasing # of African-American artists who found work, community, and security in urban areas

What did African Americans experience in the North that was similar to life in the South?

violent racism and social exclusion and cities adopted policies like redlining to restrict growth and infrastructural integrity of black neighborhoods

How are African American contributions often portrayed in retrospective accounts of the 1920s?

their contributions are underappreciated or even erased

What other group of immigrants also increased in the 1920s?

European immigrants

what percentage of the population was an immigrant or child of an immigrant in 1920?

45%

European immigrants faced black last from what?

anti-immigrant, racist, and nativist organizations as well as discriminatory legislation.

What group was reborn in the 1920s?

The Ku Klux Klan

How does racism and ethnocentrism influence the Great Gatsby?

direct representational choices but also dictates what sort of characters are marginalized within the story.