HIST 405N Week 5 Discussion: Industrialization, Imperialism, and America s Entry Into WWI – African Americans & Women’s Rights Activities

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HIST 405N Week 5 Discussion: Industrialization, Imperialism, and America s Entry Into WWI – African Americans & Women’s Rights Activities The primary groups that represented minority groups ... during the years 1880 to 1914 include women's rights activists and African Americans. The two groups represented broader minority groups, noting that women’s rights activists championed for the rights and wellbeing of women, for example, the right to vote, which they enjoyed in 1920 (Boussahba-Bravard, 2007). Similarly, the struggle by African Americans, including the American civil war saw the extension of human rights to many minority groups, including Asian Americans. Women's rights activists pushed for the rights of women during the turn of the century because they were marginalized socioeconomically. The evidence of marginalization included poor quality of life because many, if not all, were not actively engaged in socio-economic and development programs such as employment, income generation, and voting (Boussahba-Bravard, 2007). The group was also limited to the home circle as housewives, domestic workers, and victims of violence and abuse. As a result, women suffered higher levels of poverty, endured violence and poor mental health, and lacked earning ability. However, the industrial revolution had a major impact on women, considering that it offered them more opportunities to enter the workforce, and thus got opportunities for socio-economic growth. The group got many opportunities in the textile sector and coal mines, which improved the well-being of their families. The progressives affected women positively during the 1890s and early 1900s, as they pushed to end political corruption, access to employment, and other opportunities, and improved the protection of the group by the government, for example, allowing them to vote (Boussahba- Bravard, 2007). The success of the progressives included the passage of the law allowing women to vote in 1920, after the struggle that took decades. African Americans also endured an adverse socioeconomic status and challenges, noting that they continued to suffer segregation and marginalization, even after the abolishment of slavery. Further, the group was equally marginalized in education and the workplace, having lower attainment and earning lower incomes, which led to more problems such as a lack of housing (Muhammad, 2019). For example, the ratio of homeownership between African Americans and whites was as low as 1 to 2, indicating socioeconomic marginalization. The industrial revolution affected African Americans positively, by offering access to wage labor in corporations that were growing in size, allowing them to earn more and more (Muhammad, 2019). The progressives brought reform that benefited African Americans in many ways, including access to more social and political opportunities aimed at improving the situation of the group, for example, protections of workers. The progressives were successful in improving government responsiveness, towards improving the conditions of African Americans, noting the changes in areas such as the Pendleton Act of 1883 expanded opportunities for African Americans by directing that all hiring be based on merit. References Boussahba-Bravard, M. (2007). Suffrage outside suffragism: Britain 1880-1914. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Muhammad, K. G. (2019). The condemnation of blackness: Race, crime, and the making of modern urban America, with a new preface. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. [Show More]

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