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Chicago Is More Than a Media Talking Point
Chicago native Joshua Adams writes in a piece at Ebony that the media need to change the conversation about his hometown. Although the city frequently makes headlines because of its spiraling crime rate, media talking points never include the impact of institutional racism on the lives of residents, he says. Conservatives will bring up violence…
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America Postracial? Right!
ln light of intractable racist attitudes that are repeatedly expressed in heinous encounters across the nation, Brittney Cooper writes at Salon that America is a long ways away from becoming postracial, despite accomplishments by blacks like President Obama and Oprah Winfrey. The 50th anniversary of the 16th Street church bombing in Birmingham, Ala., was sandwiched…
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Lil JoJo, Chicago's Gang Wars and Social Media
As social media sites like Twitter and Facebook continue to change the way we communicate, they also affect the way we live — and, sometimes, die. Case in point: the short life of rap artist Lil JoJo. Wired magazine’s Ben Austen looks at the late Chicago teen’s death, his rivalry with fellow Chicago rapper Chief…
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Quote of the Day: Alice Childress on Racism
Read more quotes from Alice Childress here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute 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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How NFL Virgin Can Help Black Community
(The Root) — There has been little to celebrate in media in recent weeks — particularly if you are a black American. In addition to this week’s tragic Navy yard shooting, of which the alleged perpetrator, Aaron Alexis, was black, there was a report from the U.S. Census Bureau that the majority of American children…
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Martin Luther King's Secretary to Auction Collection
Fresh on the heels of the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington when the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech, his personal secretary is set to auction off a page from the iconic address, along with more than 100 other items, the Associated Press reports. Maude Ballou…
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Discovery of 1st Black Female Novelist
(The Root) — Each February the Swann Auction Galleries in New York City holds an auction of rare artifacts from the black past. It features all sorts of treasures, like slave chains and other instruments of torture, daguerreotypes and sepia-tinged photographs, rare books and lithographs and occasionally handwritten manuscripts, usually letters but sometimes something as…
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$99K in Donations Flood in for Homeless Man Who Returned $42K
With all of the bad news making headlines these days, Glen James represents a welcome change. You see, James has been homeless since 2005. He made news this week when he returned a lost backpack containing $2,000 in cash, almost $40,000 in traveler’s checks, Chinese passports and other personal papers despite his harsh situation, ABC 7 reports. He…
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Gun Control: If Not Now, When?
(The Root) — This week in the nation’s capital, 12 innocent people were massacred as a crazed gunman used a Remington 12-gauge shotgun to rain down terror upon a lobby of unsuspecting Navy yard employees who were having breakfast and beginning their day. This is the face of freedom and Second Amendment rights in America’s…
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Black Actors Who've Tackled the Bard
Keli Goff is The Root’s special correspondent. Follow her on Twitter. Before the age of 30, Rashad has already earned more accolades in her brief acting career than some do in a lifetime. Rashad has appeared in two Broadway productions, 2012’s Stick Fly and 2013’s Trip to Bountiful, and earned Tony nominations for both performances.…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
