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Slavery in the 18th and 19th century usa
Slavery in the 18th and 19th century usa
Great depression of the 1920's
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The Great Depression. The worst financial crisis to ever hit America. Unemployment rates of over 25%. A 50% decrease in national income. Billions of dollars lost in a single day. (Trotter, pg.8) The Depression affected everyone in America. Young and old, rich and poor, black and white, none were spared. However, for America’s 12 million African Americans (Encyclopedia of Race and Racism) the Depression didn’t just start in 1929.(Africa to America: From the Middle Passage Through the 1930s) African Americans were a subjugated minority. Racism wasn’t only present in America, it was accepted by many. In the South, Democrats fought to keep African Americans under harsh segregation and oppressive laws. (Trotter, pg. 9) Efforts to relieve African Americans from their dire situation were repulsed and shut down as often as possible. (Trotter, pg. 9) Despite all this, African Americans fought back against their oppression and tried to organize themselves to promote their interests. (Africa to America: From the Middle Passage Through the 1930s, pg. 36) In time, their situation improved and they managed to slowly recover from the damage caused by the Depression. In the book Of Mice and Men the character Crooks is a black man living during the Great Depression. He faces prejudice and is not well liked by the other men. His experience is just one of the twelve million African Americans who lived and struggled during the Great Depression.
The Great Depression had severe political ramifications for African Americans. The Depression occurred during the presidency of Herbert Hoover, a former mining executive and Secretary of Commerce.( Encyclopedia of the American Presidency) His Republican administration received strong backing from African Ame...
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...w York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2004. 8-17. Gale Power Search. Web. 19 May 2014.
"New Deal and Old Racism." Encyclopedia of Race and Racism. Ed. John Hartwell Moore. Vol. 2. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2008. 364-368. Gale Power Search. Web. 19 May 2014.
Horne, Gerald. "National Negro Congress." Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History. Ed. Colin A. Palmer. 2nd ed. Vol. 4. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2006. 1614-1615. Gale Power Search. Web. 22 May 2014.
"Hoover, Herbert Clark (1874–1964)." Encyclopedia of the American Presidency. Michael A. Genovese. New York: Facts on File, 2010. 240-241. Facts on File Library of American History. Gale Power Search. Web. 22 May 2014.
Severance, Ben H. "Reconstruction." Americans at War. Ed. John P. Resch. Vol. 2: 1816-1900. Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005. 141-144. Gale Power Search. Web. 22 May 2014.
Heidler, David Stephen, and Jeanne T. Heidler, eds. Encyclopedia of the American Civil War: a
Reconstruction(1865-1877) was the time period in which the US rebuilt after the Civil War. During this time, the question the rights of freed slaves in the United States were highly debated. Freedom, in my terms, is the privilege of doing as you please without restriction as long as it stays within the law. However, in this sense, black Americans during the Reconstruction period were not truly free despite Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. While legally free, black Americans were still viewed through the lens of racism and deeply-rooted social biases/stigmas that prevented them from exercising their legal rights as citizens of the United States. For example, black Americans were unable to wholly participate in the government as a
The Great Depression, beginning in the last few months of 1929, impacted the vast majority of people nationwide and worldwide. With millions of Americans unemployed and many in danger of losing their homes, they could no longer support their families. Children, if they were lucky, wore torn up ragged clothing to school and those who were not lucky remained without clothes. The food supply was scarce, and bread was the most that families could afford. Households would receive very limited rations of food, or small amounts of money to buy food. This led to the starvation of families, including children. African-americans faced tougher challenges than most during the Depression due to discrimination. The classes hit hardest were middle-class
Gordon, T. (2010, January 1). Reconstruction. The story of us. Retrieved April 17, 2014, from https://www.nmc.edu/tgordon/storyofus/hst112/1_reconstruction/index.html
The African-American Years: Chronologies of American History and Experience. Ed. Gabriel Burns Stepto. New York: Charles Scribner 's Sons, 2003.
"The Depression, The New Deal, and World War II." African American Odyssey: (Part 1). N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Mar. 2014.
Perman Michael, Amy Murrell Taylor. Major Problems in the Civil War and Reconstruction. Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2011.
Nabrit, James M. Jr. “The Relative Progress and the Negro in the United States: Critical Summary and Evaluation.” Journal of Negro History 32.4 (1963): 507-516. JSTOR. U of Illinois Lib., Urbana. 11 Apr. 2004
The Great Depression struck the United States in 1929, and devastated the country for 12 years (Potter). Filled with hardships and poverties, these 12 years seemed like a lifetime to most people, especially to the lower and middle class. American society during the 1930s was split into three main classes: Lower class, Middle class, and the Upper class. While the majority of the upper class continued to live lavishly, the lower class, consisting of mainly struggling laborers and almost all African Americans, definitely suffered the most. The Middle class was also heading down a dangerous path. Not being able to maintain their small fortunes, most were forced to lower levels of society. The effects of the Great Depression in the 1930s on the social classes in the south caused many people to move to the lower class.
The Great Depression shook every aspect of the nation, leaving a gash in United States history. On the day the Stock Market crashed, the United States seemingly crashed with it. After a decade of prosperity, Black Tuesday came as a surprise to most Americans. Ten years of economic uncertainty and poverty laden streets followed. Lives were altered by the Depression, giving way to a new culture surrounding the need to make necessary sacrifices in the face of instability.
During the great depression many men were lonely as the went from job to job, never making stable relationships. One character in Of Mice and Men, Crooks, is especially lonely because he is the only negro on the farm. He is separated completely from all the white men except during work hours. He is not allowed to play cards or talk with them unless its work related. He even has to sleep with the animals in the barn instead of in the bunk house with all the white men. This causes Crooks to be unfriendly, lonely and to lose all hope. In John Steinberg’s Of Mice and Men, Crooks exemplifies the degrading effects of loneliness and segregation on men.
John A. Kirk, History Toady volume 52 issue 2, The Long Road to Equality for African-Americans
1 (Winter 1994): 120. Eric Foner, A Short History of Reconstruction (New York: Harper and Row, 1990), 240-42. Kenneth M. Stampp, The Era of Reconstruction, 1865-1877 (New York: Vintage Books, 1965), 186. 18. What is the difference between a '' and a ''? Eric Foner and John A. Garraty, The Reader’s Companion to American History (New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1991), 287.
Rudolph, Alexander Jr. Racism, African Americans and Social Justice. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2005. 71. Print.
Myrdal, Gunnar, et.al. 1944. An American Dilemma; The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy. New York: Harper.