At the height of their careers in the Harlem Renaissance, celebrated African American writers Langston Hughes and Alain Locke found themselves in an apartment in Paris, where they met the likes of Réné Maran, the first Black writer to win the French Prix Goncourt, and Leopold Senghor, the revered Senegalese poet and politician. It was the apartment of Paulette Nardal, the eldest of the seven accomplished Martinican sisters who brought the best creative minds of the Afro-anglophone and -francophone worlds to produce the acclaimed Négritude movement.
An extremely accomplished group of women, their names, in order of birth, are Paulette, Emilie, Alice, Jeanne, Lucy, Cécile and Andrée. Between the women are distinguished educators, writers, community organizers, musicians, political ambassadors, and religious leaders. Though each of the women was engaged in intellectual and creative pursuits, most of the archival information tell of the legacy of Paulette and Jeanne Nardal as actively engaged in pan-African politics. Nevertheless, their collective legacies underscore the significant role women played in shaping Black identity across the pan-African world.
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