Oju Africa, a division of the African mobile company Mi-Fone, has one-upped tech giant Apple, launching the first set of black emojis ever, the International Business Times reports.  The collection of 15 emojis is a direct result of an outcry over the lack of diversity in the current set, much of which comes from Apple.…

After increased backlash, the mural of new Vanderbilt University football coach Derek Mason is going to be changed, The Tennessean reports. It has been more than two decades since the tradition of painting coaches’ portraits  on the wall was started, but now students have petitioned for this particular image to be changed. Mason himself has said…

Three white Pittsburgh police officers were convicted of falsely arresting a black student at a performing arts high school, although they escaped charges of using excessive force to detain the youth, the Associated Press reports. Jordan Miles, now 22, was awarded about $119,000 in damages from an all-white jury of four men and four women.…

A fourth-grader from Washington County, Pa., was killed early Monday morning from a shot fired inside the apartment where she lived, WPXI reports. Investigators believe that little Taniyah Thomas was the victim of an attempted home invasion. The shooter allegedly entered the building from a bottom-level door and went upstairs and began firing shots. The…

Changes in U.S. Army grooming policies are drumming up cries of racial bias, with some saying they discriminate against black women who have natural hair, Al-Jazeera America reports. According to the news site, the Army Regulation 670-1—which has not yet been published or made official—includes tightened rules for grooming, particularly regarding how women in the…

The collection is haunting: black-and-white stills of another place from another time, a documentation of the Gullah, or Geechee, people—a population of African descendants living on the Sea Islands off the Eastern coastline. The images of a place and a people that time forgot were captured by celebrated photographer Jeanne Moutoussamy-Ashe—the wife of renowned tennis…

Make way for an unlikely duo. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and NFL star Richard Sherman were spotted together at an NCAA game in Memphis, Tenn., on Thursday rooting for their favorite team, the Stanford Cardinals. Rice, a professor at the esteemed school since 2009, and Sherman, part of the 2013 Super Bowl-winning Seattle…

Conservative-leaning newspaper the Washington Times announced on Thursday that it will be launching a magazine specifically targeting black conservatives, FishbowlDC reports. The new magazine, called the American CurrentSee, will bring together big names in the black conservative world, including former neurosurgeon Ben Carson, who will be publisher; political commentator Armstrong Williams as executive editor; and…

Yesterday NBA star Kobe Bryant, in an interview with the New Yorker for the March 31 issue, criticized the Miami Heat’s famous “hoodie” photo that the team took to show solidarity with the slain Florida teen and his family. “I won’t react to something just because I’m supposed to, because I’m an African American,” he reportedly said.…

Trinity College in Hartford, Conn., has elected its first African American and first female president in its almost 500-year history, according to a press release. Joanne Berger-Sweeney, Ph.D., will become the 22nd president of the college starting July 1. Sweeney, who is currently dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at Tufts University in…