How Did Du Dubois Impact On The Philadelphia Negro

Du Bois was born in 1868 and died at the age of 95 in 1963, and throughout his life, he wrote thousands of essays and published over twenty books, including The Philadelphia Negro in 1899, and The Souls of Black Folk in 1903 (Du Bois and Zuckerman (ed.), 2004). This essay will focus on The Philadelphia Negro, where Du Bois shares his findings on how black people in Philadelphia were living at the time. Bobo, an American sociologist, wrote the introduction for the 2007 edition of The Philadelphia Negro, and he states that Du Bois focused on several factors which affected the lives of black people, including their history of enslavement, racial discrimination, such as in education, and their economic circumstances, which he claims that Du Bois

Du Bois (2007) found that in the Seventh Ward in Philadelphia, only 2% of black men over 21 were in learned professions, such as teaching, while 45% were servants, and for women over 21, 37% were domestic servants and 27% were housewives and day labourers. In addition, black people were far more likely to lose their jobs through no fault of their own, and they would generally be paid lower wages (Du Bois, 2007). Black people also struggled with finding work as they often had few skills due to their history of enslavement, as well as the fact that there was more competition from an increasing number of immigrants (Du Bois, 2007). The problems that black Philadelphians faced with employment then caused serious poverty, with crime and pauperism of black people seeming to exceed that of white people, which was expected due to most black people being from a lower social class (Du Bois, 2007). This shows how the fact that most black Philadelphians could not find well paid, skilled work caused poverty which then led to further issues in their lives, including poor housing and poor health, illustrating how economic factors did have a significant impact on the lives of black