culture
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The Danger of Forcing the ‘Runaway’ Label on the Missing DC Girls
Double-digit numbers of young black and Latinx girls in the nation’s capital are missing and, as expected, there has yet to be a national outcry. Instead, within the past week, Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department and other social media outlets are now focused on emphatically underscoring the message that social media distorted the stories and…
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How Gentrification Destroys Black Voting Power
Remember when the nation’s capital was so black that Parliament Funkadelic nicknamed Washington, D.C., “Chocolate City”? Maybe you’re old enough to remember when California’s Bay Area was so black that it birthed the Black Panthers and everyone knew what Sir Mix-a-Lot meant when he rapped about an “Oakland booty.” If you’re too young for that,…
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Watch: Artist Lina Iris Viktor on the Misconceptions of Blackness in Art, and Painting With Pure Gold
Artist Lina Iris Viktor is known for creating works using a palette of black, majorelle blue and pure 24-karat gold, but she refuses to be tied down to any particular aesthetic. She has a background in film, photography and performance art, so her work is expressed across multiple media. When we spoke, she was intensely…
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Meet the Detroit Mentor Who Inspired That Emotional Father-Son Scene in This Is Us
Like a lot of young men today, Jason Wilson, CEO of the Cave of Adullam Transformational Training Academy in Detroit, grew up without his father around. Struggling with his emotions and resentment toward his mother, Wilson turned to the martial arts. Today he’s turned his childhood struggles and his passion for martial arts into an…
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The War at Morehouse
The phrase “black America” may often be overlooked as a trite colloquialism, but it gives voice to the collective experiences of a community forged in fire. Black America is not enveloped inside or beneath the United States of America that we love to hate and hate to love. No, black America exists alongside a nation…
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Why This Season’s Underground Should Be in Every Conversation About the War on Drugs
Over the last few years, I have spent a lot of time thinking, talking and writing about the war on drugs, particularly how it affects black women. And it is clear that the writers of WGN’s Underground, the exceptional runaway hit show that tracks the movements on the Underground Railroad, have been, too. There are…
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Watch: Women at Work: This First Lady Redefines the Role
Editor’s note: For Women’s History Month, The Root is celebrating women from a wide range of professional industries in our video series Women at Work. “People expect women to be a certain way. They expect black women to be a certain way,” says Chirlane McCray, the wife of New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio. “You…
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The World Changed, but Dave Chappelle Didn’t
Remember Evel Knievel? In the 1970s and ’80s, Robert “Evel” Knievel Jr. leaped into the American zeitgeist and became one of the most famous people in the country by electrifying audiences with his motorcycle stunts. He leaped over 14 buses on a motorcycle. Millions of people watched him attempt to jump the Snake River Canyon.…
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9 Reasons to Check Out John Singleton’s BET Series, Rebel
OK, those Rebel commercials on BET haven’t exactly moved you, even if this show is intended to fill the void left by the midseason finale of Being Mary Jane. Because it’s 2017 and black TV isn’t as sparse as it once was, you still have those Netflix Dave Chappelle comedy specials to get to, not…