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 Langston Hughes
Website Evaluators
Leslie Bezich - San Pedro High School, California
Virginia Brackett - East Central University, Oklahoma
Randall Heeres - Northern Michigan Christian High School, Michigan
Chris Huber, on leave, Missouri
Patricia Penrose - Nogales High School, California
Dr. Nancy Price - University of Texas at Arlington, Texas
Charles R. Sanders - San Pedro High School, California
Amy Sullins - McMinn County High School, Tennessee
Barbara K. Youel - Middlebrook Education Center, Ohio
Roslyn Zuccarelli Gerken - Lincoln High School, New Jersey
Website Reviewer and Compiler
Charles R. Sanders - San Pedro High School, California
Site Ratings
1 = Poor 2 = Fair 3 = Good 4 = Excellent
American Academy of Poets: Poets of the Harlem Renaissance and After
http://www.poets.org/exh/Exhibit.cfm?prmID=7
Langston Hughes and seven other "major figures of the Harlem Renaissance" are featured in
this "beautiful site that...celebrates the art of poetry." The reader will find not only biographies, photos, and samples of the writers' works, but will also be able to "hear the voice
of the poet as he/she reads." There are several fine links to examine, including "journals & zines," "indices & general resources," and "Find a Poet," which "allows users to type in a
poet's name and explore the American Academy of Poets vast biographies." This site "truly personalizes the poetry experience." The Langston Hughes page, not as spectacular as the
rest of the site, consists of a brief biography and nine complete poems. Be aware that one must have a computer capable of downloading the type of audio player required for this site.
Overall Rating: 4
Cyberguide: The Poetry of Langston Hughes
http://www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/score/langhu/langhutg.html
This terrific website offers "a wealth of suggestions" for the study of Langston Hughes.
Teachers "may select from a number of activities," including "creating an author brochure, bookmark, or poster, making an image map, or writing an e-mail letter to a Langston Hughes
study group." These activities "work toward answering three specific questions intended to promote understanding of Hughes and his work."
Overall Rating: 4American Memory
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/mcc:@field(SUBJ+@band(+Hughes,+Langsto n++1902+1967++))
"With an address like this, one would hope to find something very special at the end of it." That something special is a series of five photocopies of the original rough draft of Langston
Hughes' poem, "The Ballad of Booker T." Although there are no support materials for teachers, it is interesting to see the evolvement of a poem from its first draft to a polished
work of art. The site is "a fine destination for students who are writing poetry," and they can see that "even prominent poets have to edit their original work."
Overall Rating: 3
Harlem Renaissance 1919-1937
http://www.csustan.edu/english/reuben/pal/chap9/CHAP9.HTML
If you are looking for "basics on the Harlem Renaissance including...biographies of 23 notables," with an emphasis on Langston Hughes, then this site may be beneficial. Teachers
and students will find "abundant information about Hughes and...his contemporaries, with a period discussion, an event chronology, bibliography and discussion of proper MLA format,
and 26 research/study questions, several of which spotlight Hughes." Despite a "distracting notebook format with small type and poor graphics," the site could be "used as a springboard
for...research, documented essays, etc."
Overall Rating: 3Harlem Renaissance Art
http://www.cc.colorado.edu/Dept/EN/Courses/EN370/EN3707117Garcia/
"Photos, art and poems of several Harlem Renaissance artists and writers are beautifully presented in this...high-quality" site. Poets featured here include Langston Hughes, Countee
Cullen, Zora Neale Hurston, and Jean Toomer," among others. The paintings included in the site are "extremely attractive, leaving the user wanting to see more of the same." This website
could provide an "excellent introduction to Harlem Renaissance art for any student, (and) lends itself to interdisciplinary possibilities."
Overall Rating: 3Home to Harlem
http://www.hometoharlem.com/Harlem/hthadmin.nsf/harlem/homepage
Visitors to "Home to Harlem" will have an opportunity to take a visual tour of modern Harlem as well as a trip back through time to the city of the Harlem Renaissance. Most useful to
teachers and students may be the links where they can find "biographies and sample works from such writers as Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, and Richard Wright," or those where
they can "visit historic sites...complete with narrative and period photos." If one can ignore the advertising of "places that a local Chamber of Commerce would proudly highlight," then
the site could be "utilized as an auxiliary resource" for investigating this literary period.
Overall Rating: 3Jazzonia
http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~nick/e309k/texts/hughes/hughes.html
Perhaps the greatest value of this site, which consists of Langston Hughes' poem "Jazzonia" and a good biography of the poet, lies in the many links to other relevant sites. Students
could use the poem and the biography as a resource, but "this is a teacher's paradise." There are lesson plans, student project ideas, and class assignments that teachers can use
immediately. "It is possible to get lost in all the sites that are linked here."
Overall Rating: 3Langston Hughes, HarperAudio
http://town.hall.org/Archives/radio/IMS/HarperAudio/052694 harp ITH.html
A nice source for four of the "Simple Stories," by Langston Hughes: "Simple on Indian Blood," "A Toast to Harlem," "Last Whipping," and "Feet Live Their Own Life." Each
recording is about eight minutes in length and is read by actor Ossie Davis, who does a fine job with the dialect and intonations. This site "can be part of a unit on the short story, oral
interpretation, dialogue writing, the Black experience, American literature, and American history, among others." Students of all ages will enjoy these four Hughes stories. Although
they are short, they are humorous, and will probably leave the student thirsting for more of his stories. One valuable link leads to a computer sound file with recordings of the works of
32 authors, in addition to Langston Hughes.
Overall Rating: 3Signifyin(g) as a Rhetorical Device in Selected Writers of the Harlem Renaissance
(Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Richard Wright)
http://members.macconnect.com/users/r/rodneyo/thesis.htm
This master's thesis offers "an intriguing study" of Harlem Renaissance writers Langston
Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Richard Wright, "through examination of acts of 'signifyin.'" The author provides a "thoughtful analysis of the works" of the writers
mentioned in the title, as well as modern writers like Maya Anglelou. One chapter "focuses on Hughes' story, 'Cora Unashamed,' featuring Hughes' use of 'black idiom' and 'oral
tradition,' such as 'the dozens.'" The site offers a fine "perspective on usage" but there are no lesson plans or other ideas for teachers to use. Those upper level students doing a
"linguistic analysis of the short story," or "studying inspirations of Hughes," may find some material here, but there is little personal information. The site is easily navigated; however, information is limited.
Overall Rating: 3Jesse B. Semple: Feet Live Their Own Life
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/6359/simple.htm
"An attractive page that is easy to read," consists of Langston Hughes' short story, "Feet
Live Their Own Life," of the Jesse B. Semple series. Other than this e-text, however, there is very little of value here for teachers or students. Links to other pages are not relevant to
Hughes, and when one tries to obtain a copy of the short story, only half of it prints out.
Overall Rating: 2Langston Hughes
http://www.nku.edu/~diesmanj/HUGHES.HTML
Although the site lists "a wealth of simply and beautifully mounted material," only five of
fifty-two listed Langston Hughes poems may be accessed at any one time. Teachers may find the links, which include a Harlem Renaissance home page with chronology and a Black
Renaissance journal, to be of more value than the e-texts of five poems. Students might access this site from time to time, as the five poems change periodically. One major
disappointment is finding more biographical information about the author of the website than about Langston Hughes.
Overall Rating: 2The Poetry of Langston Hughes
http://www.novia.net/~aaronk/ls/hughes.html
This site consists of two short poems, "Justice" and "Still Here." Teachers will find no lesson plans, projects, or other ideas. Because the poems "project both public and private attitudes
found in Hughes' work," students could compare and contrast the pair, but there are no links or anything else of interest. Although the site loads quickly and is easily navigated, it is
designed with "deplorable color choices: yellow text on a black background."
Overall Rating: 2Smithsonian Institute Photo by Carl Van Vechten
http://www.150.si.edu/150trav/remember/r914.htm
This very small site features a fine black and white photo of Langston Hughes from the
National Portrait Gallery. High school English teachers would probably like to add this picture to their collections, but biographical information is extremely brief and says more about the
photographer, Carl Van Vechten, than it does about Langston Hughes. There is one good link to the National Portrait Gallery with pictures of other writers, but "the total worth of Hughes material is slight."
Overall Rating: 2 |
