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Harlem Renaissance

Movement
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Early 20th-century African American cultural movement centered in Harlem, NY

Detailed Definition
The Harlem Renaissance was a flourishing of African American arts and intellectual life in 1920s–30s Harlem, producing poetry that fused folk traditions, jazz rhythms, racial pride, and modernist experimentation; poets like Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, and Claude McKay used vernacular speech, blues structures, and social critique to articulate Black identity and demand equality.
Example
Example in poetry:
“What happens to a dream deferred? / Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?” (Langston Hughes); “I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins” (Hughes); “We younger know the weight of song— / Our jazz, our blues, our right to belong” (Countee Cullen); “Jazzonia: where Eve dances with Cleopatra under Harlem moon” (Hughes)
Additional Notes
The Harlem Renaissance (1920s–1930s) was a flourishing of African American arts in Harlem, NY; poets like Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen fused Black vernacular, jazz rhythms, and racial pride.
Other Meanings of “Harlem Renaissance”
Also Known As
New Negro Movement Harlem lyricism Jazz Age poetry African American Renaissance verse African American Renaissance New Negro
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