culture

After 40 years, I still vividly recall the first time the music of James Brown stopped me in my tracks. I was 8 years old and wandering up the long hallway in our apartment on Chicago’s South Side. I heard the funky sounds of “Say it Loud, (I’m Black and I’m Proud)” coming from my…

Is it right to celebrate a holiday for a religion you don’t believe in? I’m not a Muslim, so I’ve never fasted for Ramadan. And because I’m not a Jew, Rosh Hashanah has been little more to me than the annoying nickname my 1st-grade classmates derived from a song in our music class. I’ve also…

Santa shouldn’t have come to my house. At least, in theory. To my mother and father, both immigrants from Ethiopia, St. Nick was always somewhat of an anomaly, an outlandish icon of someone else’s Christmas. As children, they observed the holiday on Jan. 7, like other Orthodox Christians, in accordance with the Coptic calendar. There…

Each year, Newsweek pays homage to those who we have lost in the past year. Buzz would like to echo our partners at Newsweek and take some time out to remember some of our memorable friends lost this past year. As we enter the New Year, we would like to remember Bo Diddley (Dec. 30,…

To most Americans (i.e. not Bernie Madoff, AIG execs., etc) the dwindling value of the dollar has been nerve-racking, to say the least. It has also had an impact internationally. The BBC reported one country, in which, the dollar might actually be helpful. Zimbabwe is undergoing a “dollarisation,” which seems to be offering some temporary…

The Root is having a ball! An inaugural ball, that is. And you have a chance to join us! To kick off inauguration week, The Root is throwing a grand, invitation-only, black-tie gala on Sunday, Jan. 18 in Washington, D.C. The evening event will be brimming with all of our favorite writers, movers and shakers,…

OK, this may not be politically correct to say, but I just don’t get what’s up with Kwanzaa. Our family celebrated it two or three times in the ’90s. We had a kinara, handmade by my Uncle Calvin; the seven candles, three red ones for the struggle, three green ones for hope and a black…

America has never had a terribly forthright relationship with its history. No surprise, then, that three years after Katrina laid bare the deep, deadly inequality festering in our nation’s cities, we’ve already blotted the memory. In a breathtaking article in this week’s edition of The Nation magazine, investigative reporter A.C. Thompson (you can read my…

America has never had a terribly forthright relationship with its history. No surprise, then, that three years after Katrina laid bare the deep, deadly inequality festering in our nation’s cities, we’ve already blotted the memory. In a breathtaking article in this week’s edition of The Nation magazine (reprinted today in The Root), investigative reporter A.C.…

There’s been a great deal of mystery—OK, hype—surrounding Will Smith’s newest movie, Seven Pounds. Critics were embargoed from revealing the plot twist, and in an interview with Barbara Walters, Smith cautioned her against saying anything about the flick that he was plugging: “Don’t ruin my movie, Barbara.” Watching the trailers, it’s hard to figure out…