Preview

Josephine Baker Research Paper

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
503 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Josephine Baker Research Paper
Josephine Baker was a French vedette, singer and entertainer. Her career was centered around Europe and France. Josephine Baker was an extraordinary dancer and was most well-known for doing funny faces while dancing. She first started out as a comedian performing in blackface, however, throughout the years her talent carried her to stardom. She was extremely popular and widely acclaimed in Europe. However, racism in prevented her from being accepted in the United States until 1973.
Josephine Baker was born on June 3,1906 in St. Louis. Her mother was a washerwoman and her father was a drummer before he left. Josephine grew up cleaning houses and babysitting for wealthy people. She went to school for a little while before running away.
She married and divorced three times. The first was American Willie Baker in 1921. Then a Frenchman, Jean Lion in 1937, and lastly a French Orchestra leader Jo
…show more content…
Josephine was proof that black people were not just the stereotype they often are portrayed as. She showed the entire world that she was capable of making a name for herself and gathering immense wealth. She even lived in a mansion just to prove that she could and she adopted her rainbow tribe to show everyone that different races could grow up together and love each other regardless of skin color and background. She was an icon and a symbol of change. Josephine Baker was living proof that black people could achieve the same fame and fortune as whites without having to give up their personalities or their racial identities. She contributed so much to our society in many forms, such as her talent and her positivity. She truly believed that racial tolerance was unnecessary and that if we worked hard enough slowly but surely the line between races would get smaller and smaller. She worked hard everyday to make sure that she left this planet better than she found up until the day she passed

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Lena Horne an honorary lady of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Incorporated was a great artist in the Harlem Renaissance era. Lena abilities to sing and act paved a way for many African Americans. Due to her skin complexion, she receives roles that other African American women couldn’t get. She was the first black female to receive a very long contract with MGM. Her impact encourages many great women singers today because she broke the color barrier in music. I think if it wasn’t for Lena Horne, we wouldn’t have as many women singers and rappers in the music world today.…

    • 428 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    One of the most memorable and important events in Oakley’s life was meeting her husband. She entered a Thanksgiving shooting competition and beat him. The following year she married him, Frank E. Butler, who at that time was a well known shooter. They began to work to work professionally, her stage name being Oakley. Another…

    • 423 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Have you ever watched your friends drown while you survive? Well, Molly Brown has. Molly Brown was born in Missouri in 1867. She was an actress who married J.J. Brown. Later in her life she ran for the senate, but, later pulled out of the election. Molly Brown created change because she survived the Titanic, worked as an activist for Women’s rights, and worked with helpful companies.…

    • 480 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Bessie Coleman Role Model

    • 1273 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Bessie Coleman was the first African American female pilot. Starting off in a racist Texas Bessie worked as a laundress after she dropped out of college. At the age of twenty three she decide to move in in with her brother in Chicago to find a better life. After hearing stories of World War I pilots she had a sudden interest in flying. Due to discrimination Bessie could not go to an aviation school in America, so she moved to France to pursue her dreams. After this she came back to America and became a stunt show pilot. Not only is she a role model for African Americans but also to women.…

    • 1273 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Augusta Savage Research

    • 383 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Highlighting racial bias and the identification of Race, she sculpted the life stories of the African American community, and displayed the struggles that black…

    • 383 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Annie Tall Research Paper

    • 724 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Throughout Annie’s lifetime, she made many great accomplishments, along with some bad accomplishments. Annie Tallent is remembered however you want to remember her. She is either an outstanding woman who made history for being the first woman to enter the Black Hills, or she can be the woman…

    • 724 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    "She probably will be remembered as a woman who challenged everyone. She challenged the white political leadership of the state to do what was fair and equitable among all people and she challenged black citizens to stand up and demand their rightful place in the state and the…

    • 919 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Billie Holiday (born Eleanora Harris (1915–1959) was an African American jazz singer and songwriter. Her singing style, strongly inspired by jazz musicians, lead to a new way of using word choice and rhythm. A critic named John Bush once wrote that Holiday "changed the art of American pop vocals forever." She only co-wrote a few songs, but a number of them have become jazz standards that many musicians strive to live up to. Some of these standards were set by songs of hers such as "God Bless the Child", "Don't Explain", "Fine and Mellow", and "Lady Sings the Blues". She also became famous for singing "Easy Living", "Good Morning Heartache", and "Strange Fruit", a protest song which became one of her standards and was made famous with her…

    • 442 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The lady that sings the blues was known as Billie Holiday or Lady Day to many. Billie Holiday was the greatest female jazz singer in American history. Billie started out as a young girl who, like her idols of Bessie Smith and Louis Armstrong turned whatever material she was given into a piece of art of her own. Billie Holiday stated “I hate straight singing. I have to change a tune to my own way of doing it. That’s all I know.” Billie Holiday sang as if she knew her music had so much emotional power that she had to distance herself from it…

    • 1010 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Who Was Ella Baker A Hero

    • 987 Words
    • 4 Pages

    She has subject to her period to something bigger than herself. According to Americanswhotellthetruth.org, it states that “Since Baker was most in her element behind the scenes, she didn't become as well known as some other civil rights leaders. It appeared that this was fine by her –– indeed, it was what she preferred. In her own words, ‘You didn't see me on television, you didn't see news stories about me. The kind of role that I tried to play was to pick up pieces or put together pieces out of which I hoped organization might come’” (“Ella Baker Biography”). Just like the quote indicates, throughout Baker’s life and her career as an activist, she put her skills to work, bringing people together to make change happen. Baker also believed that the various organizations working toward civil rights would suffer if they were led by individuals with great influence and power. As Americanswhotellthetruth.org noteS, “Among Baker's most passionately held beliefs was, as she put it, that ‘strong people don't need strong leaders.’” That philosophy sometimes led her to clash with Martin Luther King. With this kind of humbleness and dedication in her mind, Baker made her legacy inspire people to imagine new possibilities, lead with solutions, and engage communities to drive positive…

    • 987 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Racism has always been an issue in the United States. African Americans were always treated badly and were denied basic rights like eating at a certain restaurant or even sitting at certain place in a bus. However on December 1st one woman had had enough of the unfair treatment and finally took a stand. Rosa Parks refused to move from her seat and give it to a white bus rider and was arrested. Her arrest ignited a bus boycott lead by Martin Luther King and for 381 days African Americans carpooled, walked, or found other ways of transportation to get around town. Rosa’s dream was to see racial harmony and after taking a stand she made her dream come true. She is still significant to our society because it shows that one person and a simple action can make a change.…

    • 682 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    American jazz vocalist Ella Fitzgerald was the “first lady” of singing, swing, bebop, and ballads. Her career spanned over sixty years, she sold millions of records, and won multiple Grammy awards. She known all over the world. Ella Fitzgerald greatly impacted the way jazz music is today through her use of scatting and her perfect voice.…

    • 1838 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Justina Ford Essay

    • 595 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Justina ford inspired me and an insane amount of others related to an African American woman to follow her dreams of being a doctor or whatever they dream of accomplishing. Also, she taught me to try even if there are obstacles trying to stop you . I am not African American or a woman so it would be easier for a man to work up to this kind of job, but this shows that women around the world are trying their hardest to accomplish an accomplishment no one else could think of achieving and to me that is extraordinarily inspiring. Also, she was the first African American woman to become a doctor and that shows me that if one woman can accomplish that then I would enjoy hearing more of what other women in this kind of situation can achieve in order…

    • 595 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Josephine Baker

    • 1014 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Josephine Baker, what an incredible woman. When thinking of Josephine, the first image that would pop up for most would be of her dancing to jazz in a banana skirt. A performance that gained her a lot of fame, but in truth she is so much more than that. Were talking about a woman who even though born into poverty and prejudice manage to live an amazingly extensive life, she was a dancer, a singer, a performer, a civil rights activist, a movie star, a spy, a wife, a mother. Born in the early 1900’s she blew every stereotype about blacks and women out of the water, living the type of life that most can only dream about.…

    • 1014 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Lena Horne

    • 9265 Words
    • 38 Pages

    Singer/actress Lena Horne's primary occupation was nightclub entertaining, a profession she pursued successfully around the world for more than 60 years, from the 1930s to the 1990s. In conjunction with her club work, she also maintained a recording career that stretched from 1936 to 2000 and brought her three Grammys, including a Lifetime Achievement Award in 1989; she appeared in 16 feature films and several shorts between 1938 and 1978; she performed occasionally on Broadway, including in her own Tony-winning one-woman show, Lena Horne: The Lady and Her Music in 1981-1982; and she sang and acted on radio and television. Adding to the challenge of maintaining such a career was her position as an African-American facing discrimination personally and in her profession during a period of enormous social change in the U.S. Her first job in the 1930s was at the Cotton Club, where blacks could perform, but not be admitted as customers; by 1969, when she acted in the film Death of a Gunfighter, her character's marriage to a white man went unremarked in the script. Horne herself was a pivotal figure in the changing attitudes about race in the 20th century; her middle-class upbringing and musical training predisposed her to the popular music of her day, rather than the blues and jazz genres more commonly associated with African-Americans, and her photogenic looks were sufficiently close to Caucasian that frequently she was encouraged to try to "pass" for white, something she consistently refused to do. But her position in the middle of a social struggle enabled her to become a leader in that struggle, speaking out in favor of racial integration and raising money for civil rights causes. By the end of the century, she could look back at a life that was never short on conflict, but that could be seen ultimately as a triumph.…

    • 9265 Words
    • 38 Pages
    Powerful Essays