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Many Rivers to Cross: From Black Power to the Black President
Americans have notoriously short memories when it comes to race and history, especially black history. And it’s in that context that Harvard professor and The Root’s editor-in-chief, Henry Louis Gates Jr., has looked back through time to bring us The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross, a six-part documentary film, airing on PBS, that concludes…
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Quote of the Day: August Wilson on Freedom
Read the quote—by Memphis in the play Two Trains Running—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 Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. Like The Root on Facebook. Follow us…
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10 Friends a Black Woman Needs
Several weeks ago a black woman in Louisiana was kidnapped by her boyfriend when she went to pick up their child from day care. The police did a requisite search for her but came up empty. That’s when her family got involved. An uncle and other male relatives tracked the woman down to an abandoned…
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What a Tale of 2 ‘Johns’ Teaches Us About the N-Word
The death of a dear friend last week reminded me of a small incident, a long time ago, that might shed some fresh light on the seemingly endless debate over racial respect and who can and can’t use the word “nigger.” The friend was John Egerton, with whom I worked during the early 1970s at…
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Outgunned: Drug War Destabilizes Urban Families
Gun violence is an issue that disproportionately impacts some of this country’s most destitute communities—communities that are home to many broken families living in poor economic conditions, facing hopelessness and instability on a daily basis. A major contributor to this reality is the failed war on drugs, which has had an impact in two main…
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Nation of Islam Heir Safeguards Black History
It seems fitting that the man who would become the keeper of the world’s largest repository of African-American history came into life already shaped by the past. Khalil Gibran Muhammad is the great-grandson of Elijah Muhammad, a man who led the Nation of Islam, mentored Malcolm X and pushed black communities to become more self-sufficient.…
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Neglected Cemeteries Reveal History’s Priority
I’m into cemeteries. This is an accidental development. When my dad died in 2011, he left behind a photo of himself and eight other African-American seniors standing shoulder to shoulder behind two headstones. One is inscribed “Matthew Palmer. Died Feb 26, 1927, Aged 86.” I knew only that Matthew was my great-grandfather. No one else…
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Oh, This? This Is Just Rare Rehearsal Footage of Paula Abdul and Janet Jackson in 1986
God, I love pop music history. For you babies who have the misfortune of only knowing Ms. Paula Abdul from her dust-ups in the spotlight as an American Idol judge, I present to you the Paula of yesteryear. Outside of cranking out some of the most of the indelible pop hits of the ’80s and…
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That Time Iyanla Vanzant Accused a Rape Victim of 'Hoeing' and No One Cared
Iyanla Vanzant has many titles: author, television personality, Yoruba spiritual leader. Now we can add sanctimonious slut-shamer to this list. In the latest episode of her show, Fix My Life, Vanzant counsels two sisters from San Antonio whose relationship is suffering because of some traumatizing childhood episodes. Here’s the brief explanation from OWN: Iyanla has…
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Obama May Not Worry About His Safety. We Do
The 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination generated extensive media coverage of what happened that fateful day in Dallas, fresh discussion of conspiracy theories about who was really responsible and nostalgia for the glamour of “Camelot,” in particular the 35th president and his iconic wife, Jackie. But one less-covered angle was the impact…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
