1.
Oscar Micheaux
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Oscar Devereaux Micheaux was an African American author, film director and independent producer of more than 44 films. He produced both silent films and sound films when the changed to incorporate speaking actors. Micheaux was born on a farm in Metropolis, Illinois on January 2,1884 and he was the fifth child born to Calvin S. and Belle Micheaux, who had a total of 13 children. In his later years, Micheaux added an “e” to his last name and his father was born a slave in Kentucky. Because of its surname, his fathers family appears to have associated with French-descended settlers. French Huguenot refugees had settled in Virginia in 1700, their descendants took slaves west when they migrated into Kentucky after the American Revolutionary War, in his later years, Micheaux wrote about the social oppression he experienced as a young boy. To give their children education, his parents relocated to the city for better schooling, Micheaux attended a well-established school for several years before the family eventually ran into money troubles and were forced to relocate to the farm. Unhappy, Micheaux became rebellious and discontented and his struggles caused internal problems within his family. His father was not happy with him and sent him away to do marketing within the city, Micheaux found pleasure in this job because he was able to speak to many new people and learned many social skills that he would later reflect within his films. When Micheaux was 17 years old, he moved to Chicago, Illinois to live with his older brother, then working as a waiter. Micheaux became dissatisfied with what he viewed as his brother’s way of living “the good life. ”He rented his own place and found a job in the stockyards and he worked many different jobs, moving from the stockyards to the steel mills. After being “swindled out of two dollars” by an employment agency, Micheaux decided to become his own boss and his first business was a shoeshine stand, which he set up at a white suburban barbershop, away from Chicago competition. He learned the basic strategies of business and started to save money and this job was an informal education for Micheaux. He profited financially, and also gained contacts and knowledge about the world through traveling as well as an understanding for business. Micheaux moved to Dallas, South Dakota, where he bought land and this experience inspired his first novels and films. His neighbors on the frontier were all white, some recall that rarely sat at a table with his white neighbors. Micheaux’s years as a homesteader allowed him to more about human relations. While farming, Micheaux wrote articles and submitted them to the press, the Chicago Defender published one of his earliest articles
2.
Silent film
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A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. The silent film era lasted from 1895 to 1936, in silent films for entertainment, the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, mime and title cards which contain a written indication of the plot or key dialogue. During silent films, a pianist, theatre organist, or, in large cities, pianists and organists would either play from sheet music or improvise, an orchestra would play from sheet music. The term silent film is therefore a retronym—that is, a term created to distinguish something retroactively, the early films with sound, starting with The Jazz Singer in 1927, were referred to as talkies, sound films, or talking pictures. A September 2013 report by the United States Library of Congress announced that a total of 70% of American silent feature films are believed to be completely lost, the earliest precursors of film began with image projection through the use of a device known as the magic lantern. This utilized a glass lens, a shutter and a persistent light source, such as a powerful lantern and these slides were originally hand-painted, but still photographs were used later on after the technological advent of photography in the nineteenth century. The invention of a practical photography apparatus preceded cinema by only fifty years, the next significant step towards film creation was the development of an understanding of image movement. Simulations of movement date as far back as to 1828 and only four years after Paul Roget discovered the phenomenon he called Persistence of Vision. This experience was further demonstrated through Rogets introduction of the thaumatrope, the first projected primary proto-movie was made by Eadweard Muybridge between 1877 and 1880. Muybridge set up a row of cameras along a racetrack and timed image exposures to capture the many stages of a horses gallop, the oldest surviving film was created by Louis Le Prince in 1888. It was a film of people walking in Oakwood streets garden. Edison also made a business of selling Kinetograph and Kinetoscope equipment, due to Edisons lack of securing an international patent on his film inventions, similar devices were invented around the world. The Lumière brothers, for example, created the Cinématographe in France, the Cinématographe proved to be a more portable and practical device than both of Edisons as it combined a camera, film processor and projector in one unit. In contrast to Edisons peepshow-style kinetoscope, which one person could watch through a viewer. Their first film, Sortie de lusine Lumière de Lyon, shot in 1894, is considered the first true motion picture, the invention of celluloid film, which was strong and flexible, greatly facilitated the making of motion pictures. This film was 35 mm wide and pulled using four sprocket holes and this doomed the cinematograph, which could only use film with just one sprocket hole. From the very beginnings of film production, the art of motion pictures grew into maturity in the silent era. Silent filmmakers pioneered the art form to the extent that virtually every style, the silent era was also pioneering era from a technical point of view
3.
Jim Crow laws
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Jim Crow laws were state and local laws enforcing racial segregation in the Southern United States. Enacted after the Reconstruction period, these continued in force until 1965. They mandated de jure segregation in all public facilities in the states of the former Confederate States of America, starting in 1890 with a separate. Facilities for African Americans were consistently inferior and underfunded compared to available to European Americans. This body of law institutionalized a number of economic, educational, the U. S. military was also segregated, as were federal workplaces, initiated in 1913 under President Woodrow Wilson. By requiring candidates to submit photos, his administration practiced racial discrimination in hiring and these Jim Crow laws followed the 1800–1866 Black Codes, which had previously restricted the civil rights and civil liberties of African Americans. The phrase Jim Crow Law can be found as early as 1892 in the title of a New York Times article about voting laws in the South, as a result of Rices fame, Jim Crow by 1838 had become a pejorative expression meaning Negro. When southern legislatures passed laws of racial segregation which were directed against blacks at the end of the 19th century, during the Reconstruction period of 1865–1877, federal laws provided civil rights protections in the U. S. South for freedmen, the African Americans who had formerly been slaves, extensive voter fraud was also used. Gubernatorial elections were close and had been disputed in Louisiana for years, in 1877, a national Democratic Party compromise to gain Southern support in the presidential election resulted in the governments withdrawing the last of the federal troops from the South. White Democrats had regained power in every Southern state. These Southern, white, Democratic Redeemer governments legislated Jim Crow laws, grandfather clauses temporarily permitted some illiterate whites to vote but gave no relief to most blacks. Voter turnout dropped drastically through the South as a result of such measures, in Louisiana, by 1900, black voters were reduced to 5,320 on the rolls, although they comprised the majority of the states population. By 1910, only 730 blacks were registered, less than 0. 5% of eligible black men, in 27 of the states 60 parishes, not a single black voter was registered any longer, in 9 more parishes, only one black voter was. The cumulative effect in North Carolina meant that voters were completely eliminated from voter rolls during the period from 1896–1904. The growth of their middle class was slowed. Alabama had tens of thousands of poor whites disenfranchised and those who could not vote were not eligible to serve on juries and could not run for local offices. They effectively disappeared from political life, as they could not influence the state legislatures, like schools, Jim Crow public libraries were underfunded and often stocked with secondhand books and other resources
4.
Ku Klux Klan
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Historically the KKK used terrorism, both physical assault and murder, against groups or individuals whom they opposed. All three movements have called for the purification of American society, and all are considered right-wing extremist organizations, the first Klan flourished in the Southern United States in the late 1860s, then died out by the early 1870s. It sought to overthrow the Republican state governments in the South during the Reconstruction Era, with numerous chapters across the South, it was suppressed around 1871, through federal law enforcement. Members made their own, often colorful, costumes, robes, masks, and conical hats, designed to be terrifying, the second group was founded in 1915, and it flourished nationwide in the early and mid-1920s, particularly in urban areas of the Midwest and West. This second organization adopted a white costume and used code words which were similar to those used by the first Klan, while adding cross burnings. The third and current manifestation of the KKK emerged after 1950, in the form of small, local and they have focused on opposition to the Civil Rights Movement, often using violence and murder to suppress activists. It is classified as a group by the Anti-Defamation League. As of 2016, the Anti-Defamation League puts total Klan membership nationwide at around 3,000, the second and third incarnations of the Ku Klux Klan made frequent references to Americas Anglo-Saxon blood, hearkening back to 19th-century nativism. Although members of the KKK swear to uphold Christian morality, virtually every Christian denomination has officially denounced the KKK, the manual of rituals was printed by Laps D. McCord of Pulaski. According to The Cyclopædia of Fraternities, Beginning in April,1867, the members had conjured up a veritable Frankenstein. Although there was little organizational structure above the level, similar groups rose across the South and adopted the same name. Klan groups spread throughout the South as an insurgent movement promoting resistance, for example, Confederate veteran John W. Morton founded a chapter in Nashville, Tennessee. As a secret vigilante group, the Klan targeted freedmen and their allies, it sought to restore white supremacy by threats and violence, including murder, against black and white Republicans. In 1870 and 1871, the government passed the Enforcement Acts. The first Klan had mixed results in terms of achieving its objectives and it seriously weakened the black political establishment through its use of assassinations and threats of violence, it drove some people out of politics. Rable argues that the Klan was a failure and therefore was discarded by the Democratic leaders of the South. He says, the Klan declined in strength in part because of weaknesses, its lack of central organization. More fundamentally, it declined because it failed to achieve its central objective – the overthrow of Republican state governments in the South, for instance, the Red Shirts are credited with helping elect Wade Hampton as governor in South Carolina
5.
Race film
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In all, approximately five hundred race films were produced. Of these, fewer than one hundred remain, because race films were produced outside the Hollywood studio system, they were largely forgotten by mainstream film historians until they resurfaced in the 1980s on the BET cable network. In their day, race films were popular among African American theatergoers. Their influence continues to be felt in cinema and television marketed to African Americans, the term race film is sometimes used to describe films of the period aimed at other minority audiences. For instance, the 1926 film Silk Bouquet starred the Asian-American actress Anna May Wong and was marketed to Chinese-American audiences, African Americans produced films for black audiences as early as 1905, but most race films were produced after 1915. As many as 500 race films were produced in the United States between 1915 and 1952, sack, made some films written and directed by black talent such as Spencer Williams. Many race films were produced by white-owned film companies outside the Hollywood-centered American film industry such as Million Dollar Productions in the 1930s and Toddy Pictures in the 1940s. One of the earliest surviving examples of a black cast film aimed at an audience is A Fool and His Money. The Ebony Film Company of Chicago, created specifically to produce black-cast films, was headed by a white production team. Some black-owned studios existed, including Lincoln Motion Picture Company, and most notably Oscar Micheauxs Chicago-based Micheaux Film Corporation, on his posters, Micheaux advertised that his films were scripted and produced exclusively by African Americans. Astor Pictures also released several films and produced Beware with Louis Jordan. The last known race film appears to have been an adventure film of 1954 called Carib Gold. In the South, to comply with laws on racial segregation, though northern cities were not always formally segregated, race films were generally shown in theaters in black neighborhoods. Many large northern theaters segregated black audiences into the balconies or by later showtimes, while it was rare for race films to be shown to white audiences, white theaters often reserved special time-slots for black moviegoers. This resulted in films often being screened as matinées and midnight shows. During the height of their popularity, race films were shown in as many as 1,100 theaters around the country, produced primarily in northern cities, the target audience consisted primarily of poor southern blacks and southerners who had migrated northward. Many race films, particularly those produced by studios, expressed middle-class urban values, especially education. The most famous movie, The Scar of Shame, incorporated all of these themes
6.
African Americans
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African Americans are an ethnic group of Americans with total or partial ancestry from any of the Black racial groups of Africa. The term may also be used to only those individuals who are descended from enslaved Africans. As a compound adjective the term is usually hyphenated as African-American, Black and African Americans constitute the third largest racial and ethnic group in the United States. Most African Americans are of West and Central African descent and are descendants of enslaved peoples within the boundaries of the present United States. On average, African Americans are of 73. 2–80. 9% West African, 18–24% European, according to US Census Bureau data, African immigrants generally do not self-identify as African American. The overwhelming majority of African immigrants identify instead with their own respective ethnicities, immigrants from some Caribbean, Central American and South American nations and their descendants may or may not also self-identify with the term. After the founding of the United States, black people continued to be enslaved, believed to be inferior to white people, they were treated as second-class citizens. The Naturalization Act of 1790 limited U. S. citizenship to whites only, in 2008, Barack Obama became the first African American to be elected President of the United States. The first African slaves arrived via Santo Domingo to the San Miguel de Gualdape colony, the ill-fated colony was almost immediately disrupted by a fight over leadership, during which the slaves revolted and fled the colony to seek refuge among local Native Americans. De Ayllón and many of the colonists died shortly afterwards of an epidemic, the settlers and the slaves who had not escaped returned to Haiti, whence they had come. The first recorded Africans in British North America were 20 and odd negroes who came to Jamestown, as English settlers died from harsh conditions, more and more Africans were brought to work as laborers. Typically, young men or women would sign a contract of indenture in exchange for transportation to the New World, the landowner received 50 acres of land from the state for each servant purchased from a ships captain. An indentured servant would work for years without wages. The status of indentured servants in early Virginia and Maryland was similar to slavery, servants could be bought, sold, or leased and they could be physically beaten for disobedience or running away. Africans could legally raise crops and cattle to purchase their freedom and they raised families, married other Africans and sometimes intermarried with Native Americans or English settlers. By the 1640s and 1650s, several African families owned farms around Jamestown and some became wealthy by colonial standards and purchased indentured servants of their own. In 1640, the Virginia General Court recorded the earliest documentation of slavery when they sentenced John Punch. One of Dutch African arrivals, Anthony Johnson, would own one of the first black slaves, John Casor
7.
Lynching
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Lynching is an extrajudicial punishment by an informal group. It is most often used to characterise informal public executions by a mob in order to punish an alleged transgressor, or to intimidate a group. It is a form of informal group social control such as charivari, skimmington, riding the rail, and tarring and feathering. Lynchings have been frequent in times of social and economic tension. However, it has resulted from long-held prejudices and practices of discrimination that have conditioned societies to accept this type of violence as normal practices of popular justice. Indeed, instances of it can be found in societies long antedating European settlement of North America, the legal and cultural antecedents of American lynching were carried across the Atlantic by migrants from the British Isles to colonial North America. Collective violence was an aspect of the early modern Anglo-American legal landscape. In the United States, during the decades before the Civil War, assertive free-Blacks, Latinos in the South West, Violence rose even more at the end of the 19th century, after southern white Democrats regained their political power in the South in the 1870s. Nearly 3,500 African Americans and 1,300 whites were lynched in the United States between 1882 and 1968, mostly from 1882 to 1920, the origins of the word lynch are obscure, but it likely originated during the American revolution. The verb comes from the phrase Lynch Law, a term for a punishment without trial, two Americans during this era are generally credited for the phrase, Charles Lynch and William Lynch, who both lived in Virginia in the 1780s. Charles Lynch has the claim, as he was known to have used the term in 1782. There is no evidence that death was imposed as a punishment by either of the two men, in 1782, Charles Lynch wrote that his assistant had administered Lynchs law to Tories for Dealing with negroes, &c. In the United States, the origin of the terms lynching, Charles Lynch was a Virginia planter and American Revolutionary who headed a county court in Virginia which incarcerated Loyalist supporters of the British for up to one year during the war. While he lacked proper jurisdiction, he claimed this right by arguing wartime necessity, subsequently, he prevailed upon his friends in the Congress of the Confederation to pass a law which specifically exonerated him and his associates from wrongdoing. He was concerned that he might face legal action from one or more of those so incarcerated, Lynch was not accused of racist bias, and indeed acquitted blacks accused of murder on three separate occasions, as dictated by the facts brought before him. He was accused, however, of ethnic prejudice in his abuse of Welsh miners, William Lynch from Virginia claimed that the phrase was first used for a 1780 compact signed by him and his neighbors in Pittsylvania County. While Edgar Allan Poe claimed that he found this document, this was likely a hoax, however, linguistic evidence is strongly against it, and the story was likely invented in the 19th century. Racist extremism with an eye to viciousness and public spectacle was frequently evident, in the South, members of the abolitionist movement or other people opposing slavery were usually targets of lynch mob violence before the Civil War
8.
Brazil
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Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. As the worlds fifth-largest country by area and population, it is the largest country to have Portuguese as an official language. Its Amazon River basin includes a vast tropical forest, home to wildlife, a variety of ecological systems. This unique environmental heritage makes Brazil one of 17 megadiverse countries, Brazil was inhabited by numerous tribal nations prior to the landing in 1500 of explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral, who claimed the area for the Portuguese Empire. Brazil remained a Portuguese colony until 1808, when the capital of the empire was transferred from Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro, in 1815, the colony was elevated to the rank of kingdom upon the formation of the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves. Independence was achieved in 1822 with the creation of the Empire of Brazil, a state governed under a constitutional monarchy. The ratification of the first constitution in 1824 led to the formation of a bicameral legislature, the country became a presidential republic in 1889 following a military coup détat. An authoritarian military junta came to power in 1964 and ruled until 1985, Brazils current constitution, formulated in 1988, defines it as a democratic federal republic. The federation is composed of the union of the Federal District, the 26 states, Brazils economy is the worlds ninth-largest by nominal GDP and seventh-largest by GDP as of 2015. A member of the BRICS group, Brazil until 2010 had one of the worlds fastest growing economies, with its economic reforms giving the country new international recognition. Brazils national development bank plays an important role for the economic growth. Brazil is a member of the United Nations, the G20, BRICS, Unasul, Mercosul, Organization of American States, Organization of Ibero-American States, CPLP. Brazil is a power in Latin America and a middle power in international affairs. One of the worlds major breadbaskets, Brazil has been the largest producer of coffee for the last 150 years and it is likely that the word Brazil comes from the Portuguese word for brazilwood, a tree that once grew plentifully along the Brazilian coast. In Portuguese, brazilwood is called pau-brasil, with the word brasil commonly given the etymology red like an ember, formed from Latin brasa and the suffix -il. As brazilwood produces a red dye, it was highly valued by the European cloth industry and was the earliest commercially exploited product from Brazil. The popular appellation eclipsed and eventually supplanted the official Portuguese name, early sailors sometimes also called it the Land of Parrots. In the Guarani language, a language of Paraguay, Brazil is called Pindorama
9.
D. W. Griffith
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David Wark D. W. Griffith was an American director, writer, and producer who pioneered modern filmmaking techniques. Griffith is best remembered for The Birth of a Nation and Intolerance, the Birth of a Nation made use of advanced camera and narrative techniques, and its popularity set the stage for the dominance of the feature-length film in the United States. Today, it is noted for its radical technique and condemned for its inherently racist philosophy. The film was subject to boycotts by the NAACP and, after screenings of the film had caused riots at several theaters, Intolerance, his next film, was, in part, an answer to his critics. By the time of his feature, The Struggle, he had made roughly 500 films. Griffith is one of the founders of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and he is credited with popularizing the use of the close-up shot. Griffith was born on a farm in Oldham County, Kentucky, Jacob was a Confederate Army colonel in the American Civil War and was elected as a Kentucky state legislator. He attended a one-room schoolhouse where he was taught by his older sister, after his father died when he was ten, the family struggled with poverty. When Griffith was 14, his mother abandoned the farm and moved the family to Louisville, Griffith then left high school to help support the family, taking a job in a dry goods store and later in a bookstore. Griffith began his career as an actor in touring companies. Meanwhile, he was learning how to become a playwright, but had little success—only one of his plays was accepted for a performance, Griffith then decided to become an actor, and appeared in many films as an extra. Griffith began making films in 1908, and released his first feature film, Judith of Bethulia. A few years earlier, in 1907, Griffith, still struggling as a playwright, Porter rejected Griffiths script, but gave him an acting part in Rescued from an Eagles Nest instead. Finding this attractive, Griffith began to explore a career as an actor in the picture business. At Biograph, Griffiths career in the industry would change forever. In 1908, Biographs main director Wallace McCutcheon grew ill, and his son, Wallace McCutcheon, McCutcheon, Jr. however, was not able to bring the studio any success. As a result, Biograph co-founder, Henry Harry Marvin, decided to give Griffith the position, Griffith would end up directing forty-eight shorts for the company that year. His short In Old California was the first film shot in Hollywood, four years later he produced and directed his first feature film Judith of Bethulia, one of the earliest to be produced in the United States
10.
Chicago race riot of 1919
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The Chicago race riot of 1919 was a major racial conflict that began in Chicago, Illinois on July 27,1919 and ended on August 3. During the riot, thirty-eight people died and over five hundred were injured and it is considered the worst of the approximately 25 riots during the Red Summer, so named because of the violence and fatalities across the nation. The combination of prolonged arson, looting, and murder made it the worst race riot in the history of Illinois, the sociopolitical atmosphere of Chicago was one of ethnic tension caused by competition among many new groups. The Irish had been established first, and fiercely defended their territory, post World War I tensions caused frictions between the races, especially in the competitive labor and housing markets. Overcrowding and increased African American militancy by veterans contributed to the visible racial frictions, also, a combination of ethnic gangs and police neglect strained the racial relationships. According to official reports, the turmoil came to a boil after the death of an African American youth who had drifted into a swimming area at an informally segregated beach. Tensions between groups arose in a melee that blew up into days of unrest, in the following decades, Daley continued to rise in politics to become the citys mayor for twenty-one years. United States President Woodrow Wilson and the United States Congress attempted to promote legislation, Illinois Governor Frank Lowden took several actions at Thompsons request to quell the riot and promote greater harmony in its aftermath. Sections of the Chicago economy were shut down for days during and after the riots. Mayor Thompson drew on his association with this riot to influence later political elections, unlike southern cities at the time, Chicago did not segregate most public accommodations. According to Walter Francis White of the NAACP, pre-1915 Chicago had a reputation for equitable treatment of African Americans. However, early 20th-century Chicago beaches were racially segregated, African Americans had a long history in Chicago, the city sending its first African-American representative to the state legislature in 1876. However, the population in 1900 was only about 1 percent. Most Irish Americans and African Americans competed for jobs, causing tension between the groups. The revived Ku Klux Klan committed 64 lynchings in 1918 and 83 in 1919 in southern states, the growing African-American population settling in the South Side bordered a neighborhood of Irish Americans existing since the mid-19th century and the two groups competed for jobs and housing. African-American migrants arrived after waves of immigrants from eastern and southern Europe, there were competition and tensions in their relationships, ethnic groups were possessive of their neighborhoods, which their young men often patrolled against outsiders. Because of agricultural problems, Southern whites also migrated to the city, the rapid influx of migrants caused overcrowding as a result of a lack of adequate low-cost housing. The postwar period also found tensions rising in cities where populations were increasing rapidly
