The Construction of Blackness:Reading Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Du Bois

Abstract

Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Du Bois in their texts revealthat there is black awarenessblack utopiain their literature. They also showno place where an African American can escape the equalities of racism.But both of themfavourtheblackness withouthesitation and any shameandresistto white supremacy.However, they create blackness in their culture, literatureandeven day to day life.Langston Hughes'sThe Negro Artists and Racial MountainandHarlemsuggest the resistance of white, supremacy and proclaims the end of racism butculture focusing African American have not yet found a model for thinking and speaking outside the frameof racist ideology. So,Hughes voicewishes the equality, a vision of racial difference. Du Bois inThe Souls of Black Folkgives expression to hisprivilegingofAfrican American blackness, the problemsblack's social degradation—Negro social consciousness. He also looks the double-consciousness or one black feels his two- ness—an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts two warring ideals in oneblack body and Southern African American problems.