The Great Migration

蜜桃影像 experts explore the migration of millions of African Americans from the South to urban hubs in the Northeast, Midwest, and West, one of the largest internal migrations in American history.

A portion of the mural “Harlem Timeline鈥� by Willie Birch. A tribute to Harlem luminaries like Langston Hughes, Joe Louis, and Charlie Parker.

Reconstruction hopes, Jim Crow fears

Following the emancipation of enslaved people, white southerners increasingly turned to intimidation and brute violence to keep Black Americans from voting or accumulating wealth.

A portrait of a group of African American men

A Currier and Ives group portrait of Black representatives in the 41st and 42nd Congress.

Reconstruction

Between 1865 and 1880, the years right after the Civil War, southern states elected at least 2,000 Black officeholders, including two United States senators and 21 representatives.

This led to a backlash from southern white racists who began a campaign of terror which only grew more emboldened with the withdrawal of federal troops from the South. These were some of the major factors that led to the Great Migration.

New opportunities, new struggles

Between 1916 and 1970, the promise of non-agricultural work, higher wages, educational opportunities, and an escape from racial violence led six million courageous Black Americans to uproot their entire lives and migrate to industrial cities in the West and North.

Middle image courtesy of National Park Service, Maggie L. Walker National Historic Site.

Increased earnings

In the 1940s a rejuvenated Great Migration, away from agricultural labor toward industrial work, stimulated increases in Black American earnings.

Cooperative business models

W.E.B. Du Bois, sociologist and Civil Rights activist, devoted considerable time spreading the gospel of cooperative economics, an approach rooted in African traditions such as ubuntu (often translated as 鈥淚 am, because we are鈥�).

Dorothy West autographs a book at the book party held at Reckling Studio, 1948.

The Harlem Renaissance

The Harlem Renaissance saw the emergence of Black literary, artistic, and intellectual visionaries such as , Claude McKay, Countee Cullen, , Langston Hughes, Jean Toomer, , and Zora Neale Hurston.

Racial disparities in policing

When millions of Black Americans moved to opportunities in the thriving manufacturing centers, they discovered that some metropolitan police departments enforced the law along racial and ethnic lines.

Segregation by many names

A variety of practices, including zoning laws and mortgage refusals, increased segregation in many cities.

A generation’s mental toll

The children of migrators had higher odds of mental health disorders compared with the children of those who stayed in the South.

Half a car sitting behind a boarded up building

Stagnation

As Black Americans moved in, some cities experienced , a phenomenon known as 鈥渨hite flight.鈥� Recent research has found this may have triggered a reduction in property tax revenues and public spending. In addition, a variety of practices, including and , increased segregation in a number of these cities. Some police departments took advantage of this separation to patrol and arrest Black citizens disproportionately. All of this contributed to in many cities.

Sweeping cultural impacts

The Great Migration, and the millions who made that trip, have forever changed the history and culture of every major city in the North and West鈥攁nd indeed, the entire culture of America.

Religion

Many families saw the Great Migration as a journey of faith, connected to the biblical exodus. When they got to their new homes they adapted their practice to merge rural and urban traditions.

Language

African American English has had a profound impact on the world鈥檚 most widely spoken language, yet much of it has been obscured. 蜜桃影像's Hutchins Center and Oxford English Dictionary are working together to create a dictionary of African American English, a powerful tool to build a more accurate picture of how African American life has influenced how we speak.

Juneteenth

The freed people from Texas took Juneteenth with them during the Great Migration, to cities like Los Angeles, Oakland, and Seattle.

Explore our Juneteenth In Focus

Architecture and design

蜜桃影像's African American Design Nexus explores the intersection of design, identity, and practice in many of the Great Migration's destination cities.

Food

Food writer Michael W. Twitty shares his insights on the role Black Americans had in shaping American foodways and culinary identity in the South and in the cities to which many migrated.

Music

蜜桃影像 scholars created a digital exhibit to explore Eileen Southern, whose landmark book "The Music of Black Americans" inspired the academic subfield of Black music studies.