W. E. B. Dubois Research Paper

William Edward Burghardt commonly know as W.E.B Du Bois was a African American sociologist from Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Du Bois came in to age in the 1890s, roughly around the Progressive era. W.E.B. Du Bois was not only a African American sociologist, but also a Pan-Africanist, author, and a civil rights activist who expressed his ideas and activism freely through his studies and literature which include,The Souls of Black Folk, The Negro, Black Reconstruction, The Philadelphia Negro, and through his participation in The National Association for the advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Through his work Du Bois expressed and strived for the equal treatment of African Americans in the United States. Although W.E.B Du Bois shared the same common goal as many other social leaders, Du Bois’s ideas were expressed in a unique way which is evident in Du Bois’s Conservation of Races of 1897, that directly impacted the promotion of
industrial education, the use of science in racial characteristics, and in the increasing repression of African Americans, thus creating an uplift the lives of colored people during this era.
W.E.B Du Bois’s idea’s of science helped explain the believed racial characteristics of the different types of races in the American society. During this era the U.S society viewed people from different races and skin color differently. Around this time African Americans and people of color were looked down upon. African Americans we not given the same privileges and were treated different than people of lighter skin. Many social leaders took a stand and were willing to help African Americans change the way the black race was perceived by the rest of society, such as Booker T. Washington. However Du Bois had a different approach to help uplift and reject the negative
connotations that followed the black race. In W.E.B Du Bois’s The Conservation of Races, Du Bois expressed his beliefs that race not defined by the color of one’s skin but rather that race is biological, by sharing history, culture and beliefs with a certain group of people. Du Bois also believed that black race was very special in the development in the of the American society and it that it was their responsibility to get the negro message through.“For the development of Negro genius, of Negro literature and art, of Negro spirit, only Negroes bound and welded together, Negroes inspired by one vast ideal, can work out in its fullness that great message we have for humanity.” (Du Bios, conservation,5) Once the Negro message is fulfilled and shared the African American society will no longer be looked down upon but rather looked up to. Thus causing a change in the attitudes of others towards African Americans, and motivating the black race to leave the traits and connotations that followed them from slavery and encouraged them to live up to their powerful potential and significance in society, creating a uplift in black lives. Du Bois’s activism and notions also directly influenced the increase in the repression in the form of legalized segregation and the increase of lynching of the previously slaved African Americans. During this time period the African American society faced several difficulties as a result of slavery. African Americans still faced the same consequences of segregation which gave them unequal opportunities in education, work, and social status. In addition to the unequal