AFAM 4.1-4.3 Quiz

Négritude Movement

Négritude Movement

• Means “blackness” in French

• Political, cultural, and literary movement of 1930s-1950s

• Started with French-speaking Caribbean and African writers protesting colonialism & assimilation of black people into European culture

• Founders: Aimé Césaire, Léon Damas, & Léopold Sédar Senghor

Negrismo Movement

• Emerge in Spanish-speaking Caribbean at same time as Négritude

• Embraced by Black and mixed-race Latin Americans

• Celebrated African contributions to Latin American music, folklore, litureature, and art 

Describe the context of and connections between the négritude and negrismo movements in the first half of the 20th century.

• Early to mid 20th century: The Négritude and Negrismo movements

  • Affirmed the influence of African heritage and cultural aesthetics on Afro-descendants throughout the African diaspora

  • Movements reinforced each other

  • Both movements were influenced by the the New Negro renaissance in the U.S.

  • Both movements share emphasis on cultural pride and political liberation

  • Did not envision blackness or relationships to Africa the same

Langston Hughes role in connecting the New Negro, négritude, and negrismo movements

• Translated works from French and Spanish to English

• Translated English works to French and Spanish

Which proponents of both movements reject notion European colonialism civilized colonized subjects

• Aimé Césarie (Martinique)

• Frantz Fanon (Martinique)

• Léopold Senghor (Senegal)

Explain why proponents of négritude and negrismo critiqued colonialism.

• Argued racial ideaologies underpinned…

  • colonial exploitation

  • Violent intervention

  • Systems of coerced labor

Anti-colonial movement

• Black activists in Africa, Europe, and Americas

• Condemned racism and colonialism as interrelated means of dehuminizing people of African descent 

Civil Rights movement emerged from:

• need to eradicate segregation

• ensure federal protection of rights guarenteed by Reconstruction Amendments and Civil Rights Act of 1875 (outlawed racial discrimination in public spaces) 

Civil Rights Act of 1875

Outlawed racial discrimination in public spaces

Brown v. Board of Education 

1954 Supreme Court ruled racial segregation in public schools was UNCONSTITUTIONAL

After Brown v. Board of Education…

• De facto segregation in public schools persist despite ruling

• States cut funding for integrated schools & provided financial support to white schools

• Middle class White families fled to suburbs and private school

  • Shifted investment into schools & neighborhoods AFAM couldnt access 

How did AFAM respond to segragated transport in Black areas that lacked sufficient infrastructure for public transit

AFAM respond by operating jitneys (small buses that provided taxi services & starting own bus companies 

Define the G.I. Bill of 1944

• Designed as race-neutral gesture of gratitude toward American Veterans returning from WWII (including 1.2 million Black veterans)

• Provided funds for college tuition

• Low-cost home mortgages

• Low-interest business startup loans

• (major pillars of economic stability)

• Disproportionately dispersed to white veterans

Explain the long-term effects of housing discrimination on African Americans in the second half of the 20th century. 

20th century restrictions on AFAM to access home ownership limited their ability to build generational wealth

Redlining

• Practiced by mortgage lenders mid-20th century

• Practice of withholding mortgages from AFAM within defined geographical area under the pretense of “hazardous” financial risk posed by those communities

What racial disparities were intensified by housing discrimination

• AFAM neighborhoods had limited access to transportation, clean water and air, recreational spaces, healthy food, and healthcare services (exacerbated health disparities)