-
Help! I’m Baffled by My Neanderthal DNA Test Results
I read your column “Do Most Whites Have Traces of African DNA, as I Do?” with interest. The questioner in that column was wondering whether the traces of African ancestry in her DNA test entered her family tree recently (perhaps during slavery) or in ancient times (remnants from all of humankind’s origins in Africa). You…
-
Is This the End of the 2nd Reconstruction?
This has been a bruising time for the African-American community—as bruising as any in recent memory. The tragic deaths of Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, Eric Garner, Walter Scott, Freddie Gray, Sandra Bland, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney and the other eight victims in Charleston, S.C.—as well as others too numerous to name, but whose lives and…
-
Unbroken Spirits: Black Family Legends About Rebellious Forebears
Many of us have them: an old family story about an ancestor who was defiant in the face of oppression or who simply defied society at every turn. Such stories help define us and remind us that we come from people whose spines remained unbowed, no matter what America heaped upon them. Below are three…
-
From Where in Africa Were the Slaves Who Landed in Va.?
From which African countries did the slaves brought to Virginia come? I know from the results of a saliva test I had 20 years ago that my maternal line was traced to western Nigeria—the Hausa tribe. However, I also want to know in which African country my Virginian paternal line originated. —Carolyn Nicholas As previously…
-
When a Slave Ship Figures Into Family Lore
Last month marked the 176th anniversary of the slave-led mutiny aboard the schooner Amistad. That act of bravery on July 1, 1839, resulted in freedom for 35 Africans after a legal process that culminated in having a former president, John Quincy Adams, plead their case before the Supreme Court. Freedom, however, was not in the…
-
What Happens When Cubans Speak About Anti-Black Racism in Their Country
Editor’s note: With the U.S. Embassy reopening in Havana on July 20, The Root is giving some insight and perspective into the lives of Afro-Cubans who suffer discrimination and economic distress, even in the midst of the Cuban revolution that Fidel Castro declared put an end to racism. Harvard professor and The Root Chairman Henry…
-
One-on-One With Afro-Cubans: What It Means to Be Black in Cuba
Editor’s note: With the U.S. Embassy reopening in Havana on July 20, The Root is giving some insight and perspective into the lives of Afro-Cubans who suffer discrimination and economic distress, even in the midst of the Cuban revolution that Fidel Castro declared put an end to racism. Harvard professor and The Root Chairman Henry…
-
I’m White, but Tests Show I Have East African DNA. How?
Editor’s note: This article was originally published on Aug. 1, 2014. I am very much a “white” person, with no family oral history to suggest otherwise (except the obligatory Native American-ancestor stories, which don’t pan out). However, when I had a test done for myself by Ancestry DNA, my results came back with around 1…
-
Read Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s Acceptance Speech for the duPont Award
Editor’s note: The Root’s editor-in-chief, Henry Louis Gates Jr., was one of 14 recipients Tuesday night of an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award for his six-part PBS documentary, The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross. Here’s his acceptance speech for the award: Thank you so very much, Cynthia McFadden, for that very kind introduction. I sat…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
