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Alvin Ailey Opening Night Gala
On Tuesday evening, the Kennedy Center hosted the 30th annual Opening Night Gala benefiting the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. The evening is known as one of the most lively philanthropic events in Washington, mixing notable Washingtonians immersed in the arts, philanthropy and politics. As a member of the benefit committee hosting the event, The…
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Ex-Conductor Files Suit After Co-Worker Cut Dreadlocks
Solomon Perry was “victimized, assaulted and harassed” by racist co-workers while trying to do his job as a train conductor at the Illinois Central Railroad, according to a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago, the Associated Press reports. Co-workers hurled racial slurs over radios and in graffiti left throughout his workplace in the…
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Woman Who Lit Olympic Flame Tweeted This Racist Obama Photo
The task of lighting the Olympic cauldron at the opening ceremony—and marking the official start of the Games—is one typically reserved for the most celebrated, honorable athletes of the host country. Former Russian figure skater Irina Rodnina and former hockey goalie Vladislav Tretiak, who have six gold medals between them, did so at the opening…
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Racial Slurs Used in More Than 10,000 Tweets Per Day
Racial slurs appear in more than 10,000 tweets per day, according to a recent study conducted by Demos. The think tank mined more than 125,000 English-language tweets and discovered that close to one in every 15,000 contained racial epithets. The most common slurs are pretty gross. They include “Paki,” “nigga,” “spic,” “crow” and “squinty.” Oh,…
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Microsoft’s New Leadership: Is Tech Embracing Diversity? Not Quite
A remarkable aspect of Microsoft’s announcement of new leadership this week is that hardly anyone brought up the issue of race. Yet the biggest software company in the world will now be led by an Indian-American chief executive officer and an African-American chairman. The announcement that insider Satya Nadella, 46, will become the third CEO of…
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Quote of the Day: Claude McKay on Harlem Women
You can read this quote from Claude McKay’s novel, Home to Harlem (1928), and other quotes from McKay, in Bartlett’s Familiar Black Quotations. Read how the quote is referenced here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and founding director of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University. He…
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Shani Davis: Skating for History, Not Love
Speed skater Shani Davis will go down in history for his succession of Winter Olympic firsts, most notably as the first African-American athlete to win an individual gold at the Winter Games. But in his own sport, he is celebrated for his extraordinary record of sustained excellence. Over the past decade, Davis has dominated speed…
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How the Urban Bush Women Got Their Name
Left of Black host Mark Anthony Neal visits with Jawole Willa Jo Zollar in the Reynolds Industries Theater at Duke University. Zollar and her dance troupe, Urban Bush Women, are partaking in a two-week residency at Duke University. Urban Bush Women celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. Watch:
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Do Most Whites Have Traces of African DNA, as I Do?
“I have had both of my parents’ ancestry tested by 23andMe, and I have been tested as well. I am ostensibly European, but both parents received West African-ancestry DNA results. I am 1.3 percent West African, which Doug McDonald of the University of Illinois verified as being of Yoruba origins. “My father has 1.4 percent…
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AIDS Activist Michael Tikili: ‘I Saw My Reflection, I Saw the HIV Infection’
Five years ago, Michael Tikili had a hard time looking at himself in the mirror because every time he saw his reflection, he saw “the infection.” Hearing, in 2009, that he had contracted HIV had shaken him to his core. The 23-year-old African-American Duke University graduate racked his brain to figure out how this could…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
