When Africa Awakes: The “Inside Story” of the Stirrings and Strivings of the New Negro in the Western World

Virgin Islands-born, Harlem-based, Hubert H. Harrison’s When Africa Awakes: The “Inside Story” of the Stirrings and Strivings of the New Negro in the Western World is a collection of over fifty articles that detail his pioneering theoretical, educational, and organizational role in the founding and development of the militant, World War I era “New Negro Movement.” Harrison was a brilliant, class and race conscious, writer, educator, orator, editor, book reviewer, political activist, and radical internationalist who was described by J. A. Rogers as “perhaps the foremost Aframerican intellect of his time” and by A. Philip Randolph as “the father of Harlem Radicalism.” He was a major radical influence on Randolph, Marcus Garvey, and a generation of “New Negro” activists. This new Diasporic Africa Press edition includes the complete text of Harrison’s original 1920 volume; contains essays from publications Harrison edited in the 1917-1920 period including The Voice (the first newspaper of the “New Negro Movement”), The New Negro, and the Garvey movement’s Negro World; and offers a new introduction, biographical sketch, and supplementary notes by Harrison’s biographer, Jeffrey B. Perry.