This book explores the transformative energy and excitement that African Americans expressed in aesthetic and civic currents that percolated the opening of the 20th century and proved a force in the modernization of America. This engaging reference text represents the voices of the era in poetry and prose, in full or excerpted from anecdotes, editorials, essays, manifestoes, orations, and reminiscences, with appearances by major figures and often overlooked contributors to the Harlem Renaissance. Organized topically and, within topics, chronologically, the volume reaches beyond the...

More than the story of one man's case, this book tells the story of entire generations of people marked as "mixed race" in America amid slavery and its aftermath, and being officially denied their multicultural identity and personal rights as a result.

Contrary to popular misconceptions, Plessy v. Ferguson was not a simple case of black vs. white separation, but rather a challenging and complex protest for U.S. law to fully accept mixed ancestry and multiculturalism. This book focuses on the long struggle for individual identity and multicultural recognition amid the...