Sharecropping is a form of agriculture where the owner of the land lets the tenants utilizes the land in exchange for a divide of the crop produced on the land for instance 50% of the crop. The system of sharecropping has quite a long past and there exists an extensive variety of varied situations and types of accords that have been included in the system (William, 2008). Some are presided over by convention and others by law.It started at the end of the civil war and most of the people who were working in the lands were the blacks who had been freed from slavery. They were given tools of the tenant and land and once the season of harvest was over, they would give the owner of the land a part of the crops that they had as a way of payment. They kept the remaining crops to themselves and that served as the payment for their work.
Many African Americans preferred sharecropping to wages since leasing was desirable even under the system of sharecropping than a wage labor since tenants could control their own time and be more autonomous than hired laborers. It was also less hard for them to look for their personal food. The other reason as to why they preferred sharing crops to wage labor was because they had very strong ties with their relatives and this motivated them to remain within the South as sharecroppers.
So many sharecroppers ended destitute and tied to a plantation because they were enforced into a series of arrears. For instance, state merchants who lent money to acquire goods charged elevated charges of interest for the advances and protected them with liens or claims on the coming year’s crop. In most cases, it was almost impossible for them to pay the loans and they therefore ended up falling into debt (Wilkie, 2000). There were a number of factors that compelled the black people to leave the South and head towards North in the period of 1914 and1929. For instance, the African Americans were seeking to run away from the problems that were brought by racism in the South and they also felt that they could get better jobs and a generally better life in the North. Other reasons that led to the movement were brought about by changes in the economy by W.W.I. There were also many empty factory jobs. The agriculture in the Southern was also going through very harsh difficulties.
2.
A number of factors also drew them to the North in the period of 1914 and 1929. They went to seek better homes and also seek political rights. Another factor was that when the world war one started, very many people who were working in the factories were made to leave their jobs at the factory and work in the armed forces and this contributed to a scarcity of workers. This led to an increase in demand of labor workers and at the same time, it brought an opportunity for the black workers to at least get better jobs (Sutherland, 2004). This also led to an increase in population of people in Chicago and also Detroit. Even though the factory employers hated taking up black people they had no choice but to employ them.
One of the other reasons as to why they moved to the North was the boll weevil plague of the cotton plantations in the late 1910 and this threatened them of starvation. The cotton price in the global market had also depreciated. At this point, the railroad organizations also needed labor and so they encouraged the African Americans to leave south and head North. They even took care of their journey expenses.
The great migration served as a turning point in the history of African Americans since it freed them from forced labor by the European colonialists. However the Emancipation Proclamation signed by Abraham Lincoln declared the slaves free in the parts of the confederate States of the U.S. this great migration aided them in improving their education and as a result, their lives improved too. They also got access to unskilled jobs and this helped them advance their societal status too. It was a great turning point for them since they were also able to put up their personal business. The huge migration apparently helped the African Americans of the current generation in getting a better life than the one they had. They were given equivalent rights and also prospects in work, education and a variety of institutions.
3.
There were differences in similarities between the New Negro Movement, Marcus Garvey and the UNIA together with the Harlem renaissance. The major similarity is that the UNIA was formed by Marcus Garvey back in Harlem. After the huge Migration, the New Negro movement was created and it was the first mass national association among the African Americans (Hutchinson, 2007). As far as ethnic violence was concerned, blacks fought openly in huge numbers more than they had ever done before. After the Negro movement, Marcus Garvey emerged.
He was a West Indian black who came to America and his message was that the African Americans must form their own sovereign nation since they would never get any fairness as long as they were living in a white man’s country. Both movements therefore had the same intention and that was to fight for the black community. This movement however appealed many Blacks from India but later on it attracted a lot of African American emigrants from the South.
The Northern part promised to give land but they never lived up to their promise. Garvey however got opposition from both the black community and the whites and he was found guilty and then later deported. After Garvey was deported, the founder of UNIA got into the final stage of his relationship with the international black association that he had organized in Harlem close to a decade before.
Then came the Harlem Renaissance which was an edifying patriotic association resulting from the Great migration. It was some kind of a spiritual liberation. It was the original new Negro movement. This movement brought a transformation to the identity of the African Americans and their history. This movement unlike the appearance of Garvey and the Negro movement changed the culture of America in general. Majority of Americans read the thoughts and ideas of African Americans and embraced the productions of the African Americans, their expressions and style. However, in as much as the Harlem Renaissance was good for the Africans, it wasn’t able to run away from its past and culture in its aim to form a new black culture. The Harlem renaissance reflected the progressivism of the U.S in its confidence in autonomous restructuring, in its conviction in skill and literature as representatives of transformation and in its approximately naive conviction in itself and its prospect.
This movement freed them from their past life. These movements all occurred simultaneously since they had the same intention which was to free the Black community. UNIA was however not the same movement it was before (Hutchinson, 2007). It had changed to a movement that was fighting to survive fiscally and it was suffering from competition from other similar associations. New York was important to all of them since the inter war era saw the blossoming of several artistic and cultural associations of the Pan Africa especially in New York.
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African Americans in both the South and the North were greatly affected by ‘the Great Depression’ and the World War 2in various ways. For instance, very many African Americans got laid off since the economy had greatly fallen. These individuals went through a very difficult period of financial instability even though basically they were able to loan or beg some money to sustain them. Others remained unemployed for long period s of time since the employers found them less attractive since they had stayed for long periods of time without employment.
Both the ‘great depression’ and the break of the ‘world war 2’ contributed to a rise of mental problems among and cases of family violence also elevated. The African Americans were deprived of access to relief and as a result, the majority of them were affected with harsh malnutrition. Most blacks were laid off especially in automobile industries. However, the World War 2 gave African Americans a possibility to revive the fight against bias and attached with other communal and political expansion to modify a nation (Hutchinson, 2007)..
African Americans responded to the great depression and the World War 2 in a number of ways. For instance, women decided to look for jobs outside the confines of their homes. Most of the married women’s husbands became unemployed and their women decided to look for jobs in larger numbers. However, it was very hard for them since they had to compete with unemployed male workers who were fierce and they also faced ethnic bigotry as well.
5.
The philosophy of non violence as articulated by Martin Luther King, Jr and other leaders of the civil rights movement in the situation of the Cold War and resurgent Southern segregationist stated that protests came up as a result of a group of people being treated unfairly by another group (Harak, 2000). It also asserts that the protests may be either violent or non violent and that violent confrontations comprises of a struggle which sees the primary party involved get into major concerns of revenge, victory and protection. This philosophy was successful especially during the struggles by the African Americans during the 1956-1966 struggles. For instance, the Montgomery bus embargo in 1955 integrated the city buses and gained state attention. It also led Martin to fame and it started revolving social rights to and non violence into a mass association.
References
Johnny E. Williams (2008). African American Religion and the Civil Rights Movement in Arkansas: Univ. Press of Mississippi
Laurie A. Wilkie .(2000). Creating freedom: material culture and African American identity at Oakley Plantation, Louisiana, 1840-1950
Harak, S. G. (2000). Nonviolence for the third millennium: its legacy and future. New York: Mercer University Press
Hutchinson, G. (2007). The Cambridge companion to the Harlem Renaissance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
Sutherland, J. (2008). African Americans at war: an encyclopedia, Volume 2. ABC-CLIO
