Hip Hop Studies Commons^™

Beyond Just The Negros’ Art: Langston Hughes And The Poetic Renewal Of Black Musical Tradition, Samuel Adewumi

All Theses

Where do we begin the study of Black music in America? Is there even a beginning to it? As a poet, how does Langston Hughes contribute to its continuance during the Harlem Renaissance? These are some of the questions that shape the trajectory of this research. In it, I set a precedent for African orature in future studies of Black music in America. Essentially, I trace the survival of African orature and Langston Hughes’s role in the sustenance and utility of its style and themes in the early 20th century. Through it, I argue that Hughes’s poetry serves not as …