culture
-
Game of Thrones Shows Us How America Treats White Supremacy
Every time I watch an episode of Game of Thrones, I am left uttering the same phrase as the proverbial man who believes the thermos is the greatest invention of all time because it keeps hot things hot and cold things cold: “How do it know?” Indeed, how do it know? How does “Dem Thrones”…
-
On Loving White People and Hating Whiteness
“There is a difference between loving white people and loving whiteness.” This is something I often say when I begin social justice conversations around topics related to race. For some, the concept is easy to process and we begin a conversation around what it means to be white and a person of privilege. For others,…
-
The Root 100 No. 1s: Melissa Harris-Perry Lets the World Know She Is Not Your Mammy
The indomitable Melissa Harris-Perry, once the voice of the weekends through her two-hour show on MSNBC—at once ritual before brunch or church or work and a much-needed respite from the unceasing whiteness of political punditry—gave us #Nerdland, that delicious slice of TV that wasn’t white-centered, wasn’t male-centered and was here for all the blerds who…
-
Ice-T on Why He’s Hip-Hop’s Unsung O.G.
Most Law & Order junkies and millennials probably only know Ice-T affectionately as the gruff, no-nonsense NYPD Detective Odafin “Fin” Tutuola on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. But the rapper Ice-T came well before his nearly 20-year run on the television show. The story of Ice-T the rapper, including his crime-ridden days and his…
-
Maybe Now Isn’t the Time, Guys
If you’re tempted to point out that you’re one of the good ones right now … please don’t. If you are upset that people of color are upset that their lives and beliefs are under assault by a resurgent, resilient, citronella-candle-filled white supremacist movement, empowered by a White House that can’t call a racist a…
-
If You’re Really Into MSNBC and Joy-Ann Reid Right Now You Have Yvette Miley to Thank
Joy-Ann Reid has become a national treasure. As one of few black faces in an anchor chair on MSNBC after the network dealt with the sudden departure of Melissa Harris-Perry in February 2016 and this February’s exit of Tamron Hall, Reid is one of only three African Americans with a regular show on the network.…
-
I’m Empty-Nesting … Now What?
Two weeks ago, I dropped my son off to college somewhere in Virginia. It wasn’t a tear-filled dropoff. You know the ones you see on television with parents sobbing as they walk away from their child’s college dorm? Yeah, that’s not how we roll. An hour before I dropped my son off, I asked him,…
-
Tracing Your Roots: Untangle My Redbone Heritage
A mystery illustrates how an 18th-century family became caught up in Virginia’s laws around race, sex and freedom. Dear Professor Gates: My book about the triracial “redbones” of the 18th century, My Bones Are Red, came out in 2005 from Mercer University Press. I’d like to pick up where I left off in my research…
-
Color of Climate: Meet a Power Player in Miami’s Fight Against Climate Gentrification
Valencia Gunder loves the 305. However, there’s one nickname she says she’s never used for her hometown of Miami—the Magic City. Though she’s lived there her whole life, the 33-year-old resident of Liberty City, a predominantly black and working-class neighborhood in northwest Miami, told The Root, “Maybe where I grew up at, it was never…
-
If Black Gay Men on TV Were All Masculine ‘Professionals,’ Would We Still Care About Diversity?
On modern-day reality-television shows, audiences often bear witness to stereotypical, one-dimensional representations of black queer men. From the iconic Miss J. Alexander on America’s Next Top Model to the frequent appearances on Real Housewives of Atlanta and even Love & Hip Hop, we have often seen narrow depictions of the black male queer experience: divas…