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'Mommy Erotica' in Black and White
(The Root) — Lounging poolside on a small island off the northeastern coast of Puerto Rico, I cracked open a hard copy of Toni Morrison’s Home, eager to devour something literary to the sound of the ocean nearby and not my usual soundtrack: the white noise of a D.C. coffee shop. Of course, I wasn’t…
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Work Out and Protect Black Hair? No Sweat
Just writing this column is taking much longer than it should have. Why? Because of excuses. In college I learned the phrase, “Excuses are the tools of the incompetent upon which monuments of nothingness are built.” The oft-repeated axiom was supposed to motivate me to study harder and be a better person in general. In…
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Putting the Brothers Back in Bromance Films
Modern bromance movies are usually missing one thing, and that’s the brothers. After peaking at the box office in the late 1990s and early 2000s with films like The Best Man, The Wood and the aptly named The Brothers, romantic comedies featuring an ensemble cast of black male leads were largely replaced by movies centered…
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I'm a Young Black Woman, and I Will Get Married
In a piece for Marie Claire, The Root contributing editor Helena Andrews says she’s declaring war on the alleged epidemic of singledom among African-American women. And her first weapon is her own relationship story. So, according to the data — and the media that are obsessed with it — I’m screwed. As a 31-year-old college-educated…
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Mrs. O's Faux 'Fro and the Politics of Hair
Just how influential is the stuff that grows out of Michelle Obama’s head? Apparently very. So much so that when a doctored photo of the first lady with thick natural curls replacing her usual straightened do hit the Internet last week, online commenters went into overdrive. Reactions to Mrs. Obama’s faked ‘fro ranged from “I…
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What Whitney Houston Taught Me
It was like a dirge of white noise all weekend. There was nowhere to hide at home because it was waiting in the background, calling to you from the next room, reminding you with a catchy hook of tragedy: Whitney Houston is dead. But while listening to the mostly repetitive litany of commentary on the…
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Who Needs Vanity Fair?
It happens the same way every year. After all the popcorn’s popped, the sticky Jujubes swept away and the only red carpet that really matters is slowly unfurled, Vanity Fair releases its annual “Hollywood” issue. For almost 18 years, the March magazine cover has always been packed with as much star power as physically possible.…
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The Joke Is on Us
It all started as a joke, says “S—t Black Girls Say” creator Billy Sorrells. But 3 million views and countless copycats later, the actor-comedian thinks that things aren’t so funny anymore. On Dec. 12, Canadian comic Graydon Sheppard debuted his “S—t Girls Say” series on YouTube, based on his popular Twitter feed of the same…
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Black Social Elites Redefining High Society
Helena Andrews is a contributing editor at The Root and author of Bitch Is the New Black, a memoir in essays. Follow her on Twitter. What is a socialite, exactly? “The word meant rich, and maybe a little racy,” according to David Patrick Columbia’s website New York Social Diary. “It meant play not work in what was essentially a Puritanical…
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2 Takes on 'Our Peculiar Institution'
It’s the holidays, so of course I’ve been thinking a lot about Santa, sleighs — oh, and slavery. Recently I finished Octavia Butler’s time-traveling and mind-altering novel, Kindred, about a black woman who gets sucked back to antebellum Maryland circa 1815. Butler uses science fiction to deftly weave together the tale of 26-year-old Dana and…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
