While Johnny Depp’s latest effort in The Lone Ranger as Tonto may be a box office flop, the actor has a great personal story to tell. New research from Ancestry.com reveals that he is a direct descendant of Elizabeth Key, a former slave who worked within the law to win her freedom on July 21, 1656. Before there was…

As if people of color didn’t already have enough to worry about, now Harvard sociologist David Williams says that racial minorities who live in race-conscious societies get sick at younger ages, have more severe illnesses and die sooner than whites, according to Psychology Today. Williams was one of several presenters at a conference last week…

(The Root) — Jurors on Tuesday could hear evidence that Florida teen Trayvon Martin may have been under the influence of marijuana on the night he was fatally shot by George Zimmerman, possibly making him hostile. Attorneys for Zimmerman, who is on trial for second-degree murder, are expected to call an expert to testify that…

(The Root) — 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 Institute for African and African American Research. Since his “rediscovery” by Stanley in 1871, David Livingstone, the legendary missionary, explorer and abolitionist, has remained one of…

(The Root) — Over the weekend, a popular gossip site posted a cutesy picture of Beyoncé and her daughter, Blue Ivy, having a playdate at a park. Bey was dressed in her casual ’90s best, her preferred look when she’s not preening for the cameras or performing (as she did Sunday night at the Essence…

Writing at the Washington Post, Jeffrey Rosen, president of the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, says that the controversial law should be reformed because Americans are being exposed to invasive technology. The problem with the government’s handling of surveillance since Sept. 11, 2001, comes down to the choice of the naked machine over the blob…

(The Root) — Harlem has come to London, and what a marvelous spectacle it is to behold. To be precise, it is James Baldwin’s Harlem of 1953 — complete with haunting, sensual jazz music, uplifting Pentecostal songs and the majestic cadences of evangelical oratory — that has the South Bank completely enthralled. Baldwin’s The Amen…

Roxane Gay’s piece at Salon declares that it’s wrong that American culture allows men to control and objectify women, from pop culture to legislative fights over reproductive rights. She cites Robin Thicke’s latest single, “Blurred Lines,” which promotes  “the age-old belief that sometimes when a woman says no, she really means yes.” In his single…