To these he was but one more addition to the vast throng of prophets. fortune tellers. voodoo men. chiromancers. magicians. psychoanalysts. soothsayers. rug cuttersWhatever that meanscassandras. evangelists. pseudoMohammedan marabouts. miracle workersall the hawksters of hope who infest Harlem s noisome side streets and set up flybynight tabernacles in dilipidated and mildewed parlors. in chapels. or in deserted vegetable stalls. In Harlem there seemed to be followers for them all. because every type of black man in the world had been lured there by the worldwide publicity given to its highly exaggerated advantages: black JewsBy the way. I did not know there were black Jewsfrom Abyssinia. natives of the Cameroon. halfbreeds from the Antilles. refugees from chaingangs. That is the kind that go to see what is doing in Harlem. But though the intellectuals scoffed. there were thousands upon thousands in whose souls the atavistic hopes of a deliverer slept. thousands who still wanted a new leader to lead them to the promised landImagine that in Americathousands who turned their minds stubbornly away from the teaching of the white man. who reverted to faith in voodoo. magic. miracles.
Identified stereotypes
Generalizing about the types of black men lured to Harlem and their reversion to voodoo and magic.