James Weldon Johnson Essay - 654 Words

James Weldon Johnson James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938), was a highly talented and celebrated African American writer. He was a poet, songwriter, novelist, literary critic, and essayist. Along with his wide-ranging literary accomplishments, Johnson also served as a school principal, professor of literature at Fisk University, attorney, a diplomatic consul for the United States in Venezuelaand Nicaragua, and secretary for the NAACP from 1920-1930. He is considered one of the founders of the Harlem Renaissance and the first modern African American. Johnsons primary concerns were with the black writer. This included what the black author needs to know and what he must do in order to produce quality work. Johnsons ideas on blackness†¦show more content†¦Along with this viewpoint, he stessed black distinctiveness within notions of spirituality and creativity. In much of his works, this idea of black distinctiveness was paralled with the legitimacy of black literary independence, another concept of which he was a proponent. While Johnson was a highly celebrated and versatile literary figure, his most well known work is The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man . Even though this title suggests that this work was his own story, it was actually a novel, the first African-American one to mask itself as an autobiography. In this novel, the illegitimate son of a southern white man and his mulatto mistress struggles to find his identity and place in the world. Being light-skinned, he does not discover his black blood until he is segregated from the white students in his school. As he ages, he leaves the south to discover his identity. His travels lead him to New York City as well as Europe. The narrator, who is never named, struggles with his mixed heritage and concludes that he must decide whether to embrace his African-American self and or pass for white and devote his life to accumulating wealth. His first attempt is to be a proud black man and adopt the struggle for racial justice. After witnessing a devasta ting lynching, however, he reverses his original course and focuses on passing for white. In doing so, he travels andShow MoreRelatedThe White Witch By James Weldon Johnson964 Words   |  4 PagesEnglish 11 2/17/17 The White *itch â€Å"And back behind those smiling lips, / And down within those laughing eyes,.../ The shadow of the panther lurks, / The spirit of the vampire lies† (25, 26, 29, 30). The supernatural poem â€Å"The White Witch† by James Weldon Johnson gives us an insight to what lay behind the curtains during the Harlem Renaissance. The poem takes a real life situation of the era, white women luring black men to their death via false blame, and portrays it as a fairy tale. Using symbolismRead MoreThe Harlem Renaissance By James Weldon Johnson Essay1885 Words   |  8 PagesRenaissance began years earlier with African-American genre of literature. James Weldon Johnson was one such writer who sifted through the roughage to promote great writers. Johnson was a reckoning force behind the great push for the Harlem Renaissance. According to The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Johnson favored the memories of his students from the rural South but, he did not condone the use of black dialect. Johnson challenged African-American writers to, â€Å"express the racial spirit fromRead MoreOf An Former Colored Man By James Weldon Johnson Essay2163 Words   |  9 PagesIn James Weldon Johnson’s â€Å"Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man,† the is written narrator to be perceived at face first as an average white male, when in fact he is inherently of colored descent. Consequently, in regards to society s principle of the one-drop rule, the narrator then faces an identity complex in understanding whether he is black since society has categorized him on the account of his bloodline, or white because of his external appearance. For at the end of the novel, he makes the consciousRead MoreThe Autobiography Of An Former Colored Man By James Weldon Johnson Essay2267 Words   |  10 PagesThe Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, James Weldon Johnson James Weldon Johnson’s novel The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man was first published in 1912. This novel is one of the highly celebrated works during the Harlem Renaissance although it was published prior in 1912. Johnson graduated from Clark Atlanta University in 1894. He was appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt as United States consul to Venezuela and Nicaragua. He also was highly involved in the Harlem Renaissance with hisRead MoreThe Road That Led African Americans986 Words   |  4 PagesLaws were enacted and in effect in the South, which led to the mass migration to the North, and even in the North, Blacks still experienced some indifference, though not on the same scale as they had in the South. In Lift Every Voice and Sing, Johnson uses rhyming which of course is standard of most poetry. He also uses simile in line five with his comparison of how the sound of joy should be loud like that of the rolling sea. Lift Every Voice and Sing is both carefully and craftily composed, andRead MoreAmerican Architecture : Constructing An Identity1434 Words   |  6 Pagesracial and female identities have been at the epicenter of many works of art throughout American culture as can be seen in: Maggie: A Girl of the Streets by Stephen Crane, film â€Å"Modern Times,† Bessie Smith’s â€Å"T’ain’t Nobody’s Bizness If I Do,† and James Weldon Johnson’s Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man. For starters, both Maggie: A Girl of the Streets by Crane and â€Å"Modern Times† describe a woman with a lack of agency. Cranes novel focuses on the central figure of Maggie. Maggie exemplifies a womanRead MoreRemembering the Harlem Renaissance646 Words   |  3 PagesFund, which gave Savage $1,800 to study in Paris. Savage returned to the United States in 1931, during the Great Depression. She struggled to find work as a sculptor but was able to sell several busts of prominent black leaders, including: James Weldon Johnson, Frederick Douglas, and W. C. Handy. Yet most of her work at the time came from education instead of art. Savage founded her own teaching studio, the Savage Studio of Arts and Crafts, during the early 30’s. Soon after, she began enrolling blackRead MoreThe Autobiography Of An Former Colored Man By James Weldon Johnson2162 Words   |  9 PagesJames Weldon Johnson author of The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man discusses the issue of race and ide ntity in his short story. Writing in first person Johnson follows the unnamed protagonist from childhood up to adulthood, he demonstrates in different areas how this unnamed man handles his identity and his race as colored. The fact that he remains nameless throughout the story shows more of the connection between identity and race. During the course of the story Johnson’s protagonist makes theRead MoreAdoption Are Beating The Adoption Odds By Cynthia D. Martin1035 Words   |  5 PagesCharles R. Johnson (Goodreads Author) (Preface By), Ralph Ellison, John F. Callahan (Editor), Ralph Ellison, John F. Callahan (Editor), Saul Bellow (Preface By), Ralph Ellison, Robert G. O Meally (Editor), Ralph Ellison, Albert Murray, John F. Callahan (Editor), and Ralph Ellison, John F. Callahan (Editor), Adam Bradley (Editor). Ralph Ellison. Goodreads. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Nov. 2016. 1c. The author of The autobiography of an ex- colored man is James Weldon Johnson. Johnson, James W. The AutobiographyRead MoreEssay about Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man and Jews Without Money877 Words   |  4 Pageswas left to make the choice about his college education. His runaway father offered to pay for his college education only if he attended Harvard University, not Atlanta University the college that his mother â€Å"had a half desire for [him] to go† (Johnson 33). Since his mother died, he was the only person left to make the decision and ended up deciding where he and his mother wanted him to go: Atlanta University. While finding a unique identity, a person must be careful who he trusts. Giving valuable