culture
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Fresh Dressed: 10 Reasons You Should Watch This Stylish Hip-Hop Fashion Doc
After flipping through the September fall fashion issues of my favorite magazines with black “it” girls such as Beyoncé, Kerry Washington, Serena and Misty Copeland on their covers, I’m unusually interested in clothes. All that paging through magazines got me wondering: Where are all the black-owned fashion brands? Yes, of course well-known black brands still…
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Where Are They Now? 10 Years After Hurricane Katrina, a Look Back at How 9 Key Players Responded
When Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast 10 years ago, it would become the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history, causing an estimated $108 billion in damages. It would also be one of the deadliest. The storm caused approximately 1,833 deaths across five states, with the most casualties in Louisiana: 1,577. Katrina was a Category…
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Follow the Money: How New Orleans’ Charter School System Influences Both Economic Development and Injustice
In part 1 of our series on post-Katrina New Orleans’ public education and charter school systems, “‘Like Another Katrina’: The Charter School Debate Fractures New Orleans Along Lines of Race and Class,” The Root took a comprehensive look at the educational, cultural and racial effects of the charter school system, which rapidly expanded in the…
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60 Years After Emmett Till, Families Still Fight for Justice
As long as there is breath in our bodies … I’m tired and I don’t want to write this, but unfortunately, the story of Emmett Till—a story of senseless brutality and murder, all for the sake of white supremacy—continues to need telling. On Aug. 24, 1955, J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant kidnapped and killed Emmett…
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In War Room, Prayer Is the Weapon
Prayer is a strategy. That is the message of a new faith-based movie from the Kendrick Brothers, who are two of Hollywood’s most successful directors and producers in the religion-faith genre. Their past movies include Fireproof, Facing the Giants and Courageous. The Root was on-site for the red-carpet premiere of their latest film, War Room, in Dallas…
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The Napa Valley Wine Train, the Jim Crow Car and Who Has the Right to Ride
In the context of the past year’s tensions over police violence, the story of the Sistahs on the Reading Edge book club—11 women, 10 of them African American and one white, ranging in age from 39 to 85—whose members were ejected from the Napa Valley Wine Train for being “too loud,” may not evoke the same…
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‘Like Another Katrina’: The Charter School Debate Fractures New Orleans Along Lines of Race and Class
Katrina. The mere mention of the Category 5 monster of a hurricane that barreled down the Gulf Coast and made landfall in the early-morning hours of Aug. 29, 2005, as a Category 3 is enough to retraumatize New Orleans natives who were forced to flee their homes in search of shelter. “The Storm,” as it’s…
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What Makes Black Men Run From the Police?
It’s never much of a surprise when I hear it, but it stings all the same. Freddie Gray would be alive today if only he hadn’t inexplicably sprinted down his West Baltimore street. As would Walter Scott, the African-American man who was shot in the back in South Carolina fleeing a white police officer who…
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My Jewish Boyfriend Claims He Loves Me, but He’s Keeping Our Relationship a Secret From His Family
Dear Demetria: I’ve been with my guy for almost a year. I am completely in love. We talk every day; he tells me he loves me almost every day. I’m black. He’s white and Jewish. He always talks about “If we’re married … ” and about being together in the future. But our relationship is…