In the YouTube talk that you watched for Unit 2, “How We Got to Newark: Stories
In the YouTube talk that you watched for Unit 2, “How We Got to Newark: Stories of the Great Migration,” Dr. Katie Singer () gives us the history of the Great Migration when African Americans left the South and moved to the urban northeast, midwest, and west. She explains that the Great Migration had two phases that roughly occurred from 1910 to 1940 and then from 1940 through the 1970s.
Southern African Americans were looking for employment in industrialized cities like Newark. During World War I and World War II there was a labor shortage as men went to fight oversees, especially white men. This created a need for African Americans to fill open positions in the factories. Black women, however, were still relegated to domestic work and service positions. When the wars ended and soldiers returned home, Black men and women were often fired from these jobs in favor of rehiring the returning soldiers. Besides looking for work, African Americans also migrated to escape racial violence in the South, particularly lynchings.
Dr. Singer also talks about oral histories from the Krueger-Scott Oral History Collection, which is the largest collection of oral history interviews conducted with African American residents of Newark who came to the city during the Great Migration. In general, oral histories are primary sources that are recorded interviews with folks about their life and the historical events they lived through.
What do the Krueger-Scott oral histories reveal about the Great Migration, life in Newark and the northeast, and the journey that African Americans took? What was it like for them to leave the South and experience living in a new place?
Feel free to pick an aspect of their experience to talk about in your response such as transportation, Northern versus Southern racism, home life, family, or work. You can either draw on Dr. Singer’s talk or discuss Coyt Jones’s experiences in “We Came & Stayed.”
For a discussion board assignment to be complete, you must write an initial response of 100 words or about 5-6 sentences.
Your comment in response to another student should be 2-3 sentences.