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Know Your Rights When Confronted by the Police
In recent months we’ve witnessed the arrests and deaths of citizens after disturbing interactions with police. In one of those cases, a bystander captured on video an incident during which Eric Garner died after being put in a choke hold on a sidewalk in New York City’s Staten Island. And just last weekend Danièle Watts, a…
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Why Every Black Man Needs to Read Charles Blow’s ‘Up From Pain’
Every man in America—particularly every black man in America—should read New York Times op-ed columnist Charles M. Blow’s recent essay, “Up From Pain,” adapted from his forthcoming memoir about identity, sexual abuse and coming to terms with his own identity as a man. Reading it is akin to listening to Nas or Kendrick Lamar at…
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White House Intruders: Remembering Miriam Carey and How She Died
On Saturday a 19-year-old New Jersey man was arrested after he tried to drive past a barricaded entrance to the White House and refused to stop. And in an unprecedented security breach Friday evening, a 42-year-old Texas man jumped a fence and ran to the North Portico and entered the White House through an unlocked…
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J. California Cooper, Author and Playwright, Dies at 82
Author J. California Cooper died on Saturday at the age of 82, reports Ebony. Cooper, who was named Black Playwright of the Year in 1978, wrote numerous short stories and 17 plays, including Strangers, Loners and Everytime It Rains. One of her best-known works is the short story “Funny Valentines,” which was turned into a made-for-TV movie starring…
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How Not to Go Broke Getting a College Education
The Root Live: Bring It to the Table returns Wednesday, Sept. 24, with a highly informative discussion about ways to get a college education without going broke. The Root Live, sponsored by Prudential, is a weekly video series tackling financial concerns in the African-American community. Since higher education is a priority for many African-American families, this is…
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Ancient Egyptian Women Buried With Weaves and Shoulder-Length Box Braids
It’s a fairly customary practice now among women—and, I suspect, especially black women—to sew in, glue in or have full-head weaves attached to their hair when they are buried. But because it seems like such a contemporary beauty regimen, archaeologists were puzzled to find a woman buried in Egypt more than 3,000 years ago with an elaborate design…
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Obama Launches Campaign to Prevent Sexual Assault on College Campuses
With violence against women at the forefront of a national conversation, the Obama administration launched a new initiative that it hopes will reduce the number of sexual assault incidents that take place on college campuses, Al-Jazeera reports. The It’s on Us campaign “seeks to engage college students and all members of campus communities in preventing sexual…
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Honoring the African Slaves of Peru With a Dance
This image is part of a weekly series that The Root is presenting in conjunction with the Image of the Black Archive & Library at Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African and African American Research. The contribution of people of African descent to the performing arts of Peru has followed a long and varied arc.…
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Everything You Were Afraid to Ask About Love
If you ask Demetria Lucas what she thinks, be prepared for a jolt of raw reality. For the past few years life coach Lucas has dished out advice on everything from bad BFFs, falling for your FWB (friend with benefits) and freaky sex at her website, A Belle in Brooklyn, and in her column, Ask…
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Charles Blow on the Complexity of the Black Male Experience
New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow’s new memoir, Fire Shut Up in My Bones, is scheduled for release Tuesday. So far, headlines about the book have focused almost entirely on one thing: Blow’s grappling with his attraction to other men. The author says that’s fair and that the attention to the issue is understandable.…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
