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  • Review: Moonlight Chronicles Discovering One’s Sexual Identity in the Worst of Circumstances

    In Moonlight, Barry Jenkins’ (Medicine for Melancholy) semiautobiographical coming-of-age story, we follow the three life stages of Chiron (Alex Hibbert), a young African-American boy trying to figure out his identity in Liberty City, a rough Miami neighborhood. Chiron, who is nicknamed “Little,” is bullied relentlessly by neighborhood boys, who have decided that he is gay…

    By

    The Root Staff

    Published

  • Johnnetta B. Cole Is a Force of Nature

    Johnnetta Betsch Cole, director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art, turned 80 years old Wednesday, and the stunning educator, humanitarian, anthropologist and mentor to many says it’s wonderful to turn what she calls “40 years old times two.” “I’m so conscious of what I would call a disconnect between the very words ‘80 years…

    By

    Allison Keyes

    Published

  • Black Folk Hate White Tears and Blatant Racism More Than Charter Schools

    To the chagrin of charter advocates, on Friday the national board of the NAACP ratified an earlier resolution (pdf) that called for a moratorium on charter schools. Given the ample sources of opposition to charter schools, as well as mixed results, we should only be surprised that it’s taken this long for a major black civil…

    By

    Andre Perry

    Published

  • The Price We Paid: Race, Reparative Justice and the Drug War [Retracted]

    RETRACTED (6/12/18): This story has been removed because we have discovered it was in breach of our editorial standards. If you’d like to know more, you can read an editor’s note here. A cached version of the story is available here for transparency.

    By

    The Root Staff

    Published

  • Thomas Mikal Ford’s Tommy Strawn Was a ’90s Fashion King

    When I was growing up, there was one question on the playground that separated the real from the fake: Martin or Fresh Prince? The only answer, really, was always and will forever be Martin. The humor was realer, rawer and funnier in just about every way. Martin, Gina, Tommy, Pam and Cole were the people you…

    By

    Terryn Hall

    Published

  • #RiseUpAsOne: We Can Build Bridges, Not Walls

    What would happen if we decided to build bridges, not walls? We’d be able to stand together—dare I say, “Rise up as one”? Together, Univision, Fusion and Sprint teamed up to create a space for that to happen, and the RiseUp as One concert was born. People gathered at the Cross Border Express in San…

    By

    Danielle Young

    Published

  • Study Confirms What We Already Know: When it Comes to Social Media, Mobile Tech Black Millennials Rule

    Black millennials are killing the game. In the 2016 Nielsen African-American report, black millennials are being described as tech-savvy, socially and civically engaged, with a growing population and growing buying power. Indeed, the report, “Young Connected and Black: African American Millennials Are Driving Social Change and Leading Digital Advancement,” indicates that black millennials are very…

    By

    Breanna Edwards

    Published

  • Why Miko Grimes’ Flavor of ‘Bou-ghetto’ Is Just Right for Me

    I don’t like words like “ratchet” or “ghetto.” In short, they are reductive, marginalize a community, and tend to assign race to behaviors that are demeaning and demoralizing. Furthermore, they’re stereotypical language that tends to segregate us. I believe it’s elitist to sit back and ascribe language to a person’s behavior and attribute that to a class…

    By

    Stephen A. Crockett Jr.

    Published

  • Visiting Egypt, the Cradle of Civilization, Can Change Your Life

    Karim El Minabawy stands on the Nile Terrace at the Semiramis InterContinental Hotel in Cairo, grinning as he gestures at the rainbow of lights surrounding the iconic river. “See these colors all around? … It is an amazing view by night. Three o’clock in the morning, you see these colors until sunrise,” says El Minabawy,…

    By

    Allison Keyes

    Published

  • Michel’le’s Surviving Compton Doesn’t Forget About Dre

    “Everybody keeps asking me, ‘Girl, why you ain’t in they movie? You was there. You was down with Ruthless Records right along with them boys,’” Michel’le Toussaint informs us in her intro to her Lifetime biopic, Surviving Compton: Dre, Suge and Michel’le. Straight Outta Compton is the movie to which Michel’le, as she is best-known,…

    By

    Ronda Racha Penrice

    Published