As a graduate student in biology, she realized that her dreams of becoming a medical researcher would be unfulfilled, due to racial discrimination at the time that imposed limitations on jobs in the science field for people of color.

[5] Eventually Primus sought help from the National Youth Administration and they gave her a job working backstage in the wardrobe department for America Dances.

Within a year, Primus auditioned and won a scholarship for the New Dance Group, a left-wing school and performance company located on the Lower East Side of New York City.

Primus continued to develop her modern dance foundation with several pioneers such Martha Graham, Charles Weidman, Ismay Andrews, and Asadata Dafora.

[9] Dafora began a movement of African cultural pride which provided Primus with collaborators and piqued public interest in her work.

This thoroughly researched composition was presented along with Strange Fruit, Rock Daniel, and Hard Time Blues, at her debut performance on February 14, 1943, at the 92nd Street YMHA.

After gaining much praise, Primus' next performances began in April 1943, as an entertainer at the famous racially integrated night club, Cafe Society Downtown.

[10] In December 1943, Primus appeared as in Dafora's African Dance Festival at Carnegie Hall before Eleanor Roosevelt and Mary McLeod Bethune.

[15] Primus' dance to this poem boldly acknowledged the strength and wisdom of African Americans through periods of freedom and enslavement.

In this case, her powerful jumping symbolized the defiance, desperation, and anger of the sharecroppers which she experienced first-hand during her field studies.

Primus believed that when observing the jumps in the choreography, it was important to pay attention to "the shape the body takes in the air".

She also appeared at the Chicago Theatre in the 1947 revival of the Emperor Jones in the "Witch Doctor" role that Hemsley Winfield made famous.

In her program she also presented Three Spirituals entitled "Motherless Child", "Goin' to tell God all my Trouble", and "In the Great Gettin'-up Mornin'."

This cannon of Negro spirituals, also referred to as "sorrow songs" branched from slave culture, which at the time was a prominent source of inspiration for many contemporary dance artists.

After receiving this funding, Primus originally proposed to develop a dance project based on James Weldon Johnsons work "God's Trombones.

But instead she decided to conduct an 18-month research and study tour of the Gold Coast, Angola, Cameroons, Liberia, Senegal and the Belgian Congo.

[citation needed] On December 5, 1948, Primus closed a successful return engagement at the Café Society nightclub in New York City before heading off to Africa.

The Oni and people of Ife, Nigeria, felt that she was so much a part of their community that they initiated her into their commonwealth and affectionately conferred on her the title "Omowale" — the child who has returned home.

When Primus returned to America, she took the knowledge she gained in Africa and staged pieces for the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre.

These artists searched literature, used music of contemporary composers, glorified regional idiosyncrasies and looked to varied ethnic groups for potential sources of creative material.

The stories and memories told to young Pearl, established a cultural and historical heritage for her and laid the foundation for her creative works.

Her many works 'Strange Fruit', Negro Speaks of Rivers, Hard Time Blues, and more spoke on very socially important topics.

Her performance of Hard Time Blues was described by Margaret Lloyd: "Pearl takes a running jump, lands in an upper corner and sits there, unconcernedly paddling the air with her legs.

She does it repeatedly, from one side of the stage, then the other, apparently unaware of the involuntary gasps from the audience...."[27] Primus' athleticism made her choreography awe-striking.

Primus' strong belief that rich choreographic material lay in abundance in the root experiences of a people has been picked up and echoed in the rhythm and themes of Alvin Ailey, Donald McKayle, Talley Beatty, Dianne McIntyre, Elo Pomare and others.

[13] These similarities show that Primus' style, themes, and body type promoted the display of Black culture within the dance community.

in education from New York University, she traveled to Liberia, where she worked with the National Dance Company there to create Fanga, an interpretation of a traditional Liberian invocation to the earth and sky.

[32] She was the recipient of numerous other honors including: The cherished Liberian Government Decoration, "Star of Africa"; The Scroll of Honor from the National Council of Negro Women; The Pioneer of Dance Award from the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre; Membership in Phi Beta Kappa; an honorary doctorate from Spelman College; the first Balasaraswati/ Joy Ann Dewey Beinecke Chair for Distinguished Teaching at the American Dance Festival; The National Culture Award from the New York State Federation of Foreign Language Teachers; Commendation from the White House Conference on Children and Youth.