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27-536: HWG may refer to: Harlem Writers Guild Hostage Working Group , organized by the United States Department of State during the Iraq War Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title HWG . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to

54-538: A non-commissioned officer in the United States Army Air Forces , ultimately attaining the rank of master sergeant . In the post- World War II era, there was new artistic development, with small presses and magazines being founded and surviving for brief times. Writers and publishers continued to start new enterprises: Clarke was co-founder of the Harlem Quarterly (1949–51), book review editor of

81-524: A farmer, Clarke left Georgia in 1933 by freight train and went to Harlem , New York, as part of the Great Migration of rural blacks out of the South to northern cities. There he pursued scholarship and activism. He renamed himself as John Henrik (after rebel Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen ) and added an "e" to his surname, spelling it as "Clarke". He also joined the U.S. Army during World War II. Clarke

108-792: A landmark protest novel of the American Civil Rights Movement and revolves around the lives of an African-American family living in Georgia under Jim Crow laws . On March 12, 1972, the Harlem Writers Guild hosted a party in celebration of Chester Himes ' autobiography The Quality of Hurt (1971) at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in New York , when those appearing on the program with Himes included Ossie Davis , Ruby Dee , and John A. Williams . In March 2021,

135-525: A root within African diaspora, somewhere many African Americans traveled to and combined feelings of culture and community. The growing prevalence of African-American art forms paved the way for a new era of African-American literature to enroll. Past and present members include: Among writers more recently added to the HWG roster are: John Henrik Clarke is just one of the influential co-founders who helped develop

162-721: A writer and lecturer during the Great Depression years. He joined study circles such as the Harlem History Club and the Harlem Writers' Workshop . He studied intermittently at New York University , Columbia University , Hunter College, the New School of Social Research and the League for Professional Writers. He was an autodidact whose mentors included the scholar Arturo Alfonso Schomburg . From 1941 to 1945, Clarke served as

189-749: The City University of New York , where he served as founding chairman of the department. He also was the Carter G. Woodson Distinguished Visiting Professor of African History at Cornell University 's Africana Studies and Research Center . Additionally, in 1968 he founded the African Heritage Studies Association and the Black Caucus of the African Studies Association . In its obituary of Clarke, The New York Times noted that

216-667: The Negro History Bulletin (1948–52), associate editor of the magazine, Freedomways , and a feature writer for the black-owned Pittsburgh Courier . Clarke taught at the New School for Social Research from 1956 to 1958. Traveling in West Africa in 1958–59, he met Kwame Nkrumah , whom he had mentored as a student in the U.S., and was offered a job working as a journalist for the Ghana Evening News . He also lectured at

243-661: The University of Ghana and elsewhere in Africa, including in Nigeria at the University of Ibadan . Becoming prominent during the Black Power movement in the 1960s, which began to advocate a kind of black nationalism, Clarke advocated for studies of the African-American experience and the place of Africans in world history. He challenged the views of academic historians and helped shift

270-511: The 1920s and 1930s, many southern African Americans traveled to Northern urban cities for greater opportunities. The Harlem Renaissance cultivated a boom of literary, music, art expressions as a channel for writers, musicians, and artists cumulatively in Harlem, New York. This boom was so prevalent it was regarded as the rebirth of African-American arts. The prevalence in the Harlem neighborhoods began as

297-482: The 1920s, the Great Migration and demographic changes had led to a concentration of African Americans living in Harlem. A synergy developed among the artists, writers, and musicians and many figured in the Harlem Renaissance . They began to implement supporting structures of study groups and informal workshops to develop newcomers and young people. Arriving in Harlem at the age of 18 in 1933, Clarke developed as

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324-585: The 1960s, the group supported Malcolm X , conflicts of independent rights in Angola and Mozambique and organized to dismantle racist policies established in South Africa. The group used their connections to communicate about marches, Freedom Rides , and other progressive organizations. In 1977, the HWG was honored by the United Nations Society of Writers . In 1986, John O. Killens estimated that members of

351-505: The Harlem Writers Guild as a space specifically for African-American literary creatives to preserve their experiences. He was an autodidact, never fully completing his education, rather learning from his mentor Arturo Alfonso Schomburg . Clarke had a strong emphasis on understanding the African-American experience through the use of cultural relativism and not through the Eurocentric distortion seen in history books. His emphasis contributed to

378-767: The Harlem Writers Guild had produced more than 300 published works of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, plays, and screenplays. Several have received literary acclaim. In 2000, the HWG announced a partnership with the digital publisher iUniverse to create its own imprint, Harlem Writers Guild Press. The anthology Beloved Harlem: A Literary Tribute to Black America's Most Famous Neighborhood (Random House, 2005), edited by William H. Banks Jr., former executive director of HWG, featured work by HWG members including Dr. John Henrik Clarke , Grace F. Edwards , Rosa Guy , Rachel DeAragon, John Oliver Killens, Walter Dean Myers , Louise Meriwether , Funmi Osoba, Diane Richards, Karen Robinson, Dr. Olubansile Abbas Mimiko and Sarah E. Wright . During

405-478: The activist's ascension to professor emeritus at Hunter College was "unusual... without benefit of a high school diploma, let alone a Ph.D." It acknowledged that "nobody said Professor Clarke wasn't an academic original." In 1994, Clarke earned a doctorate from the non-accredited Pacific Western University (now California Miramar University ) in Los Angeles , having earned a bachelor's degree there in 1992. By

432-711: The arts. He was a founding member of other organizations to support work in black culture: the Black Academy of Arts and Letters and the African-American Scholars' Council. Clarke's first marriage was to the mother of his daughter Lillie (who died before her father). They divorced. In 1961, Clarke married Eugenia Evans in New York, and together they had a son and daughter: Nzingha Marie and Sonni Kojo. The marriage ended in divorce. In 1997, John Henrik Clarke married his longtime companion, Sybil Williams. He died of

459-612: The demonstration of protest in front of the United Nations following the assassination of the Congolese Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba in 1961. John Henrik Clarke John Henrik Clarke (born John Henry Clark ; January 1, 1915 – July 16, 1998) was an African-American historian, professor, prominent Afrocentrist , and pioneer in the creation of Pan-African and Africana studies and professional institutions in academia starting in

486-403: The idea that African-American lives have worth and value, thus further preserving the black experience. John Oliver Killens was the first guild member to have their work published. Killens is known for his politically charged stories, which aim to invoke social change. He is most notable for his debut novel Youngblood , which was first published in 1954. This novel in particular is considered

513-465: The intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=HWG&oldid=932884122 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Harlem Writers Guild The Harlem Writers Guild (formerly known as the Harlem Writers Club)

540-510: The late 1960s. He was born John Henry Clark on January 1, 1915, in Union Springs, Alabama , the youngest child of John Clark, a sharecropper , and Willie Ella Clark, a washer woman, who died in 1922. ). With the hopes of earning enough money to buy land rather than sharecrop, his family moved to the closest mill town in Columbus, Georgia . Counter to his mother's wishes for him to become

567-643: The publication of works by writers of the African diaspora . Other writers who have been associated with the HWG include Lonne Elder III , Douglas Turner Ward , Ossie Davis , Paule Marshall , Audre Lorde , Maya Angelou and Sarah E. Wright . In the 1950s, John Oliver Killens had invited several aspiring African-American writers to meet at a shop in Harlem to hear and review one another's literature. The Harlem Writers Guild thus began expanding, with new authors writing and publishing work emphasizing topics such as racism, oppression, and welfare. The Harlem Writers Guild

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594-461: The spirits brand Rémy Martin teamed up with the Harlem Writers Guild to honor artists from Harlem in the "Voices of Harlem" campaign. This partnership was able to give younger generations the tools and confidence to appreciate and engage in their African-American literary legacies. Members of the Harlem Writers Guild and the Black nationalist literary organization, On Guard for Freedom, are credited for

621-622: The way African history was studied and taught. Clarke was "a scholar devoted to redressing what he saw as a systematic and racist suppression and distortion of African history by traditional scholars". He accused his detractors of having Eurocentric views. His writing included six scholarly books and many scholarly articles. He also edited anthologies of writing by African-Americans, as well as collections of his own short stories. In addition, Clarke published general interest articles. In one especially heated controversy, he edited and contributed to an anthology of essays by African-Americans attacking

648-632: The white writer William Styron , and his novel The Confessions of Nat Turner , for his fictional portrayal of the African-American slave known for leading a rebellion in Virginia. Besides teaching at Hunter College and Cornell University, Clarke founded professional associations to support the study of black culture. He was a founder with Leonard Jeffries and first president of the African Heritage Studies Association, which supported scholars in areas of history, culture, literature, and

675-412: Was a tool that was used by African-American authors of its presence to uniquely divide their literary work against mainstream literature that neglected African-American literature . Emphasizing on expanding their literary works as well as creating a space for advantageous advertisement of their work, the Harlem Writers Guild used their social circles and their academic voices towards social change. During

702-433: Was heavily influenced by Cheikh Anta Diop , who inspired his piece "The Historical Legacy of Cheikh Anta Diop: His Contributions to a New Concept of African History". Clarke believed that the credited Greek philosophers gained much of their theories and thoughts from contact with Africans, who influenced the early Western world. From 1969 to 1986, Clarke was a professor of Black and Puerto Rican Studies at Hunter College of

729-567: Was set up in 1950 as a forum where African-American writers could develop their craft. After funding for an organization active in the late 1940s called "The Committee for the Negro in the Arts" ended, these writers felt excluded from the mainstream literary culture of New York City . The HWG was also part of the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s, and its rationale continues to be to develop and aid in

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