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Idris Elba Walks in Nelson Mandela’s Footsteps
Crazy as it sounds, actor Idris Elba tells The Root, his first hesitation when approached about portraying South African leader Nelson Mandela in the film Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom was, “He’s light-skinned and I’m dark-skinned!” It was a trivial concern when weighed against the greater challenge of taking on the role of what Elba…
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Quote of the Day: Dr. Seuss on Christmas
Read more quotes about Christmas 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 is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
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Merry Christmas From The Root
Dear Readers, As 2013 comes to an end, The Root would like to thank all of you for your continued support. We are committed to providing honest, thought-provoking journalism as well as strong opinion and analysis, and we would like to think of the work we do as the beginning of a broader conversation about…
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Steve McQueen and Henry Louis Gates Jr. Talk 12 Years a Slave, Part 2
Editor’s note: You can read part 1 of this conversation here. When the creators of a drama that would bring Solomon Northup’s 12 Years a Slave to the big screen needed a historical consultant, Henry Louis Gates Jr., who edited a recent edition of the memoir, was a natural choice. Gates, a Harvard history scholar,…
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3 Tips for Finding Great Clients for Your Small Business
Editor’s note: How many times in your life have you heard some version of the words “go get a job” from well-meaning parents, teachers, friends or spouses? But has anyone ever told you to “go start your own company”? Does that seem too scary, too tough or impractical? Yes, it can be hard. And, yes,…
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De Blasio Daughter Shares Story of Depression and Substance Abuse
The family of New York City Mayor-Elect Bill de Blasio has already begun to emerge as a model American family for the new millennium. There is their multiracial makeup, comprised of de Blasio, who is white, his wife, Chirlane McCray, who is black, and their two biracial kids, Dante and Chiara. Though still rare in…
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Quote of the Day: Malcolm X on Revolution
You can read this quote from the speech “The Black Revolution” (1964), and more quotes by Malcolm X, in Bartlett’s Familiar Black Quotations. Read the quote in its full context 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…
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Steve McQueen and Henry Louis Gates Jr. Talk 12 Years a Slave
When the creators of a drama that would bring Solomon Northup’s 12 Years a Slave to the big screen needed a historical consultant, Henry Louis Gates Jr., who edited a recent edition of the memoir, was a natural choice. Gates, a Harvard history scholar, producer of PBS’s African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross and editor-in-chief…
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R. Kelly Fans, Please Stop Blaming the Victims
I can’t say I’m all that surprised about the backlash against the folks who have been denouncing R. Kelly lately. I called on people who still supported him to rethink that position after the Village Voice interviewed Jim DeRogatis—the journalist who broke the story of R. Kelly’s sexual conduct with underage girls nearly 15 years…
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Why One of the Wise Men Is Black
This image is part of a weekly series that The Root is presenting in conjunction with the Image of the Black in Western Art Archive at Harvard University’s W.E.B. Du Bois Research Institute, part of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research. In this intriguing evocation of a time-honored Christian theme, three kingly…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
