Folk Art Dbq

The Beauty of Folk Art Harlem Renaissance, also called the New Negro Movement, is where a rebirth of African American arts of all forms occurred. This time period happened between 1910 and 1930, and roughly 1.6 million African Americans chose to move to the northern cities to seek a better life. This was a time where many people used many different ways to show racial pride. Many were debating on whether folk art or high art was better to show their pride. Folk art best expresses racial pride because it tells the lives of everyday people, strengthens one’s identity as black, and encourages African American culture. Folk art was a type of art that tells everyday lives. Many used dialect with this type of art, which means that they wrote like how people speak instead of worrying about their grammar or punctuation mistakes. “An’ almost lose ma mind” was found in “Po’ Boy Blues (Doc D)”, the poet used many misspelled words to show how real people speak in their lives. This best expresses their racial pride because they were not trying to imitate or prove that they’re as good as the whites when they don’t have to, they were proud of their race, proud of being black.

African Americans believed that having the same skills as whites would express racial pride. In “Heritage (Doc A)”, a poet called Countee Cullen used many difficult words like “loin”, “barbaric”, “goading”, and “plighting” in the poem to show that African Americans are smart too. However, instead of imitating the whites, strengthening one’s identity as black would better express racial pride. In “Homesick Blues(Doc D)”, the poet also used many misspelled words in his poem, but it was no shame because that’s the way they talk and live their