Lesson video

Before we start today's lesson, I want to begin with a bit of guidance for you.

This lesson covers the topic of racism and violence against people because of the colour of their skin.

This is the background to the poem, and the reason why the poem, "If We Must Die" was written.

If this is a sensitive topic to you, recommend checking with a trusted adult before starting or doing the lesson with a trusted adult nearby.

Around 100 years ago, there was a flourishing of brilliant art, music and literature.

This cultural and intellectual movement took place in Harlem, in New York City, a place which was referred to as The Dream Capital of Black America.

In the 1920s and 1930s, many of the African American community moved from the South of America to find a new life and better opportunities in cities, such as New York.

Well, they found that it was not just a physical home, but a spiritual one.

A place where they could build a new identity and community to musical genres, such as jazz and blues.

Through political movements led by figures such as Marcus Garvey, and from powerful literature from writers such as Claude McKay, Langston Hughes, and Zora Neale Hurston.

These artists became the voice of a political and intellectual uprising.

They expressed a spirit of optimism, freedom and rebellion against injustice.

This was the Harlem Renaissance.

Hello, and welcome to lesson two on Claude McKay's poem "If We Must Die." Today, we're going to learn about the context of the poem.

So the background and what inspired the poet Claude Mckay to write this poem.

We're also going to learn about a really fascinating movement called the Harlem Renaissance.

But before we begin, let's make sure you've got a pen and some papers at hand, and you've cleared away any distractions.

Once you're ready, let's get started.

Okay, so in today's lesson, we're going to do a bit of recap.

We're going to think about what we learned in lesson one about the poem "If We Must Die." And we're also going to think about, what should we learn about approaching a poem? Then we're going to be thinking about the Harlem Renaissance.

We going to find out a little bit more about this movement.

Then we'll move on to find out about Claude McKay himself, the poet.

What can we find out about him? And we'll bring this altogether at the end to think about the context of the poem.

What we know about the background of this poem, is important for us when we're thinking about what the poem might mean.

Okay, we're going to do a quick recap on how to approach the poem.

These are the four steps we came up with when we thought about how we might approach poems. I want you to read through and see if you can remember the words are missing in these gaps.

You can pause the video now to have a go.

Okay, so hopefully you remembered these words.

Number one, listen to the poem.

Don't worry if you don't understand it all.

Number two, think about what the sounds and language make you think and feel.

Number three, think about what the poet might be trying to tell you.

And number four, explore how the poet is making you think and feel.

Let's also do a quick recap of what the poem was about Well, we don't know everything about the poem yet we're going to find out more today.

Well, we do know a little bit about what the main idea of the poem is.

So do you think it's option one about fighting between hogs and dogs? Option two, is it about people dying? Option three, is it about standing up against unfair violence? Or option four, is it about being murderous cowards? I want you to pick the option you think best answers this question.

Okay, three, two, one.

If you said option three, it's about standing up against unfair violence, you're right.

That's what we've learned the poem is about so far.

, But today we're going to find out a bit more.

Let's read the poem again, just to remind us of what we've learned about it.

If we must die, let it not be like hogs, hunted and penned in an inglorious spot.

While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs, making them mock at our accursed lot.

If we must die, O let us nobly die.

So that our precious blood may not be shed in vain.

Then even the monsters we defy shall be constrained to honour us, though dead.

O kinsmen! We must meet the common foe.

Though far outnumbered, Let us show us brave.

And for their thousand blows deal one death blow!` What though before us lies the open grave? Like men, we'll face the murderous, cowardly park.

Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back! Okay.

So we're going to think about the context now, the poem.

We've kind of remind ourselves of the poem itself, and we remind ourselves of how to approach it.

Now we're thinking about, what was the background of the poem? So before we find out about the Harlem Renaissance, we should probably learn about first time period that we call the Renaissance.

This happened, not in America, but in Europe, way back in the 15th and 16th centuries.

This was a literary and artistic movement, which means lots of people were producing books, and poems, and paintings, and sculptures and music.

And it was called, the Renaissance, because it was a new period of art which is different to what had come before.

Although actually, the artists of the Renaissance were very influenced by classical arts and culture from ancient Greece and Rome, which we can see reflected in the types of stories which were told, and the type of art which was made.

The word Renaissance actually comes from the French, for birth.

It means a rebirth.

It was also a time when some of the greatest writers we know, such as Shakespeare, were producing their work.

Here on the screen, you can see a cover from one of his books of Sonnets.

And Sonnets are going to be particularly important for us in this set of lessons.

So Renaissance represents a new period of time, often called a movement when there's lots of wonderful art, literature, and music produced.

Okay.

So what can we remember so far about the Renaissance? What was the Renaissance? You've got four options here again.

I want you to choose which one you think best answers the question, what was the Renaissance? Is it option one, the time when McKay wrote, "If We Must Die"? Is it option two, a time of violent literature? Option three, an artistic and literary movement in 15th to 16th Century Europe.

Or option four, a rebirth of classical art and culture.

And just to let you know a secret here, there are more than one correct answer here.

There's more than one correct answer.

Okay.

So have a think in your minds, which of these answers do you think answers the question, what was the Renaissance? Well, if you said option three and option four, well done.

If you only got one of them, no worries.

It was a bit of a trick having two there.

But the Renaissance was an artistic and literary movement in 15th and 16th Century Europe.

And it was a rebirth of classical arts and culture.

Great, good job.

Now that we've learned about the Renaissance, we can learn about the Harlem Renaissance.

This happened many years after the first Renaissance.

But it probably got that name because, like the European Renaissance, it marked a new period of art and literature and a change with the creation of new types of music and poetry.

It happened in a place called Harlem, in New York, in America in the 1920s and 1930s.

Nobody can really agree about specific dates of the Harlem Renaissance, but many literature experts say it began in 1919, when Claude McKay published the poem "If We Must Die".

So we're studying a poem that some people think launched the whole of this movement.

It's now exciting what an important poem this one is.

We know the Harlem Renaissance took place in.

Yeah that's right, America, the USA or New York more specifically.

And that was in the 1920s and 1930s.

But let's be really clear.

What did it involve? Well, it was a time when we have new art, new literature, so novels, poems, and plays and new music being created.

You can call this a cultural and intellectual movement, because these words describe the fact that people were making art and were thinking and expressing ideas about who they are and what the world might be.

When we say artists, we can mean writers, and painters, and musicians.

They can all be described as people who make art.

So poem or play can also be described as art.

Basically, saying artists means we don't have to list poets, playwrights, novelists, painters, musicians, and so on.

We just say artists.

Well, the artists of the Harlem Renaissance included some famous figures, such as the ones pictured here.

We have Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes, who were both writers, and Louis Armstrong, who was a musician.

Well, Harlem Renaissance was a time when artists of African descent, mainly artists whose African ancestors had been enslaved in the U.

S, were able to express their thoughts and feelings freely through their arts.

It was important time for this community of artists to express and explore black identity outside the definitions of white America.

And they did this to art, literature and music.

Okay.

So when was the Harlem Renaissance? Let's check what we've been taught so far.

Is it option one, 20th and 21st century? Option two, 1820s and 1840s? Option three, 1920s and 1930s? Or option four, 15th and 16th century? Have a think.

One, two, three, or four.

You can share it out to me if you want.

And if you said option three, 1920s and 1930s, well done, that was correct.

That's when the Harlem Renaissance was.

Let's try the next question.

Where was the Harlem Renaissance? Option one, Italy.

Option two, Europe.

Option three, Holland.

Option four, USA.

What do you think? USA, That's correct.

So the Harlem Renaissance happened in the USA, in New York, in America.

This is a bit tricky here.

What was the Harlem Renaissance? And I've made this even harder because there was actually more than one correct option here.

So have a real think about this as we go through them.

If you need to pause the video, that's absolutely fine.

Okay.

So option one, the cultural and intellectual movement led by African American artists.

Option two, a rebirth of classical culture.

Option three, a time of oppression.

And option four, a time of expression of black identity through art, music and literature.

I want you to think, what are the best definitions here of the Harlem Renaissance? Okay.

What if you said option one and option four, you'd be correct.

This is a bit tricky, but the best definitions here are that, it is a cultural and intellectual movement led by African American artists.

And also that it's a time of expression of black identity through art music and literature.

Those are the best definitions here for the Harlem Renaissance.

Now it's time for some vocabulary adventures.

So we're going to learn some new words and recaps in the ones we've learnt already.

All right, let's do a recap.

What does noble mean? So we've met the word noble in lesson one.

What can we remember that it means? Is it, option one, showing you care? Option two, being better than others.

Option three, being good and honourable.

And option four, showing confidence.

Which one of these is noble? One, two, three, or four.

You can share this one out.

And if you said option three, being good and honourable, you're correct, well done.

Okay.

We're learning a new word today.

And the word is 'oppress', to treat in a cruel or unfair way.

And this is going to be an important word to understanding the context of the poem.

Now oppress is the verb, to treat in a cruel or unfair way.

But we can talk about oppression as a noun, and that means the treatment of a group of people in a cruel or unfair way.

So for instance, in his poem "If we must die", Claude McKay was speaking out against oppression.

We can also use the word oppression to describe people, but we change the word slightly.

So if he wants to talk about the person or the people who are doing the cruel and unfair things, we call them the oppressor or oppressors.

So in the poem, the oppressors are called monsters.

And the oppressed or the person or people who are suffering from being treated cruelly or unfairly.

So the kinsmen of the poem are an oppressed group.

This is an important word for us to remember because it's going to help us talk about the poem, and about what the poem is trying to show us.

I'm going to give you some examples now of the word oppression being used in different sentences.

So an example of oppression, is when a leader refuses to give basic rights to some people in their country.

We still hear about oppression of people cause of their skin colour, religion, gender, and sexuality.

When people are not allowed to vote or go to school or get basic health care, we can consider them oppressed.

When people have more power than another group and use this power against them, we can consider them oppressors.

Okay.

I want you to have a go, working on which of these sentences uses the question correctly.

I put two in brackets because two of the sentences use oppression correctly.

So I'm going to read the sentences through, and you can pause the video to have a think about which of these sentences uses oppression correctly.

Number one, they felt oppression by them because they had been silenced.

Number two, this group of people have suffered from oppression for many years.

Number three, the oppression was completely fair.

Number four, she wrote about the oppression who had been cruel.

And number five, oppression is an unfair and cruel treatment of people.

Okay.

You can pause the video now and have a think about which of these sentences uses oppression correctly.

Okay.

Let's go through the answers and see which ones you got correct.

The two sentences, that used the word oppression correctly, are number two, and number five.

Number two, this group of people have suffered from oppression for many years.

And number five, oppression is an unfair and cruel treatment of people.

In sentence number one, they felt oppression by them because they'd been silenced.

You'd actually want to say that they felt oppressed by them because they had been silenced That's the right word to use.

In number three, the oppression was completely fair.

We know that sentence can't be right, because oppression means to treat people unfairly.

And number four, she wrote about the oppression who had been cruel.

Well, in that we'd want to talk about, she wrote about the oppressor or oppressors who had been cruel, because she's obviously talking about a person or some people.

We're now going to find out about the poet, Claude Mckay.

Who was Claude Mckay? Well, this is a picture of Claude McKay taken in 1920, a year after he wrote the poem, "If we must die" McKay was born in Jamaica in 1889.

So he's about 31 years old here.

He grew up in Jamaica and wrote about life there.

And whilst he was very proud of the influence by his Jamaican heritage and African ancestry, he'd also studied English poetry as part of his colonial education in Jamaica.

And his own poetry shows how we draw on both an established traditional poetry written in English, as well as introducing Jamaican voices and subjects.

As we know, McKay was born in 1889 and he died in 1948, which meant he lived through two World Wars.

We know he was a poet, he was also a writer of stories and articles.

This picture here is of McKay on the front of one of his first collections of poetry called "Songs of Jamaica".

He wrote this collection in 1912 and the poems were about life, family, work and identity.

They were written in Jamaican Creole, which is a language most Jamaicans speak at home, although standard English was the language of teaching and learning at school.

The book won a poetry award and McKay used money from this award to pay to go to study in America.

He moved to New York in 1914.

And as we know, he became a key figure, perhaps one of the starting figures of the Harlem Renaissance.

He was also an activist and he fought and campaigned for equality particularly in regards to race.

McKay was very shocked by the level of racism in the USA.

And lots of the poems he wrote whilst in America were protest poems. He stood up against this racism.

He did not always write protest poems, he also wrote about love, family, his home country, Jamaica, and other big ideas and emotions, But protest and activism were an important part of his life.

And he travelled all around the world, fighting for his beliefs.

Okay.

So which of these describes Claude McKay? Got four options.

Again, there might be more than one correct answer here.

So have a really hard think when you're going through these.

Option one, poet writer and activist.

Option two, lived his whole life in Harlem.

Option three, wrote only protest poetry, and option four, published poems in Jamaica and in America.

Have a thinK.

What do you reckon is the right answer? Remember, there might be more than one.

Okay.

If you said either option one or option four, you'd be correct.

He was a poet writer and activist, and he published poems in both Jamaica and America.

Option two is not right, he didn't live his whole life in Harlem, although he did live there for a while.

And option three, he did white protest poetry, but he also wrote other types of poetry as well.

Now we're going to learn about the direct context of the poem.

This just means what was happening at the time the poem was written, which might influence it.

We know that some of the context is that it was written during the Harlem Renaissance, which means there was optimism and a sense of freedom.

However, this poem was particularly influenced by a time of mass violence and racism, which is known as the Red Summer.

So we're going to learn about that regrettable context now.

In 1917, America entered troops into the first world war.

At this point, America was still a segregated country, which meant that Black Americans did not have the same rights as White Americans.

And they had to lead very separate lives.

When the war started, many African American men also joined the battle to serve their country.

As we can see in this drawing of the president Woodrow Wilson, and a woman who had children begging for help, even though the country was asking people to fight to save democracy, it was not offering the same or equal rights to its own citizens.

In fact, at the end of the war, instead of being treated like heroes as many white soldiers were, on their return to America, African American servicemen experienced even more racism and oppression.

And in the summer of 1919, there was mass violence across America, in which black Americans were attacked and sometimes killed by groups of racist white Americans.

In this photograph, we can see two men carrying out furniture from their house, which has been destroyed during riots in Chicago.

Many of the attacks and riots were carried out by white American soldiers against the same African American soldiers they had fought with during the war.

Some of the newspapers at the time also encourage these racist attacks, by false reporting about the riots, which stirred up hostility.

And the police refused to intervene in multiple situations where black Americans were being attacked or murdered.

It was the horrors of this mass violence, and series of racist riots and the outrage of the denial of black humanity that inspired Claude Mckay to write the poem "If Me Must Die".

Right, we've learned about oppression already.

We're going to now learn about racial oppression, because this is particularly important when we're reading the poem "If We Must Die".

Racial oppression is oppressing of people because of the colour of their skin.

So the poem "If We Must Die", stands up against racial oppression.

It's one of the main themes of the poem.

Let's have a read through now of the poem.

And I want us to think about this idea of oppression.

We know that racial oppression is important context for this poem.

So when we're reading it now, I want you to think about the oppressed group and the oppressors.

Think about what you know about the context and see how that changes your understanding of the poem.

If we must die, let it not be like hogs, hunted and penned in an inglorious spot.

While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs, Making them mock at our accursed lot.

If we must die, O let us nobly die, So that our precious blood may not be shed in vain, then even the monsters we defy, shall be constrained to honour us, though dead.

O kinsmen! We must meet the common foe.

Though far outnumbered, let us show us brave.

And for their thousand blows, deal one death-blow.

What though before us lies open grave? Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack.

Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back.

Before we move on to answering some questions about the poem and its context, we're going to look at these two reactions to "If We Must Die".

These are both reactions described by Claude Mckay and his book "A Long Way Home".

In the first, he says, It was the only poem I ever read to the members of my crew.

They were all agitated." Here he's describing the level of emotion felt, when people first heard the poem.

Then Claude Mckay took the poem to a magazine writer called Frank Harris.

This is Frank Harris's reaction when he read the poem.

"That is a great poem, authentic fire and blood; blood pouring from a bleeding heart." Authentic means real.

So he talks about the poem in real fire and blood.

There's blood pouring from a bleeding heart, which again, captivates the passion and emotion experienced when hearing this poem for the first time.

Okay.

We've learned a lot today about the poem and it's background.

So now, it's time to put that learning together and answer some questions about the poem in the context.

I want you to pause the video and answer these questions.

When you're finished unpause and we'll check your work.

Now we're going to check your answers.

You might not have written exactly the same as I've gotten here.

And hopefully you've actually added a few more details to your answers.

This is an opportunity to just check, if you weren't quite sure.

And make sure you've got everything written down that you need to at the end of this lesson.

So number one, when and where did the Harlem Renaissance take place? The Harlem Renaissance took place in Harlem, New York in the 1920s and 1930s.

Number two, what was the Harlem Renaissance? The Harlem renascence was a time when African American artists, musicians and writers flourished.

Number three, who was Claude Mckay? Claude Mckay was a Jamaican poet who moved to America when he was an adult.

He wrote "If We Must Die" which is seen by some as a start of the Harlem Renaissance.

Number four, what was the Red Summer? the Red Summer happened to America in 1919.

It was a time of mass violence where there are a series of racist riots and murders.

Number five, Why did Claude Mckay write "If We Must Die"? Claude Mckay wrote "If We Must Die" as a reaction to the violent events of the Red Summer.

Writing the poem was seen as way to challenge oppression.

And finally, number six, how do people react to the poem? McKay describes that his community were agitated by the poem, and the magazine owner, Frank Harris, described the poem as authentic blood and fire.

Okay.

That's all for today.

Thanks for all your amazing work.

We've tackled some really challenging concepts today.

So I hope you've been okay with that.

Well done for working hard, don't forget to complete the quiz so you can show off everything you've learned this lesson.

I'll see you next time for lesson three.

Bye.