A large social and cultural movement of the early 1900s -1930s stemming from the “Great Migration” of African Americans from the rural South to cities of the urban North of the United States. In New York City, they found their voices in a politically, socially and culturally vibrant Harlem. Harlem was considered the black cultural mecca of the U.S. and African diaspora, and the center of activity for creative arts, including painting and sculpture, photography, literature and letters, drama, songs, dance and live performance. The period spawned writers and poets like Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston, whose writing encouraged African Americans to take on an independent, enlightened approach to education, culture and politics.
