culture
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Lauryn Hill Concert Review: Star Still Arrives Onstage Late but Is Worth the Wait
Maybe the two-city Small Axe: Acoustic Performance Series tour signals Lauryn Hill’s return to the contemporary-music scene. Her sporadic appearances and legal troubles did little to give fans hope that the artist who blew us away on the Fugees’ The Score and the path-breaking The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill was indeed back for real, for…
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The Root Hosts manCODE Event in NYC
Wednesday night in New York City at the event space 404, 180 African-American men came together to network, share insights and engage with a multigenerational panel of black men from all walks of life. The Root’s annual event, called manCODE, sponsored by Prudential, is designed to provide a safe space where men can speak openly about…
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Supreme Diva: 5 Iconic Diana Ross Moments
Editor’s note: This week we’re celebrating the birthdays of phenomenal performers who not only share late-March birthdays but who also have voices that have defined their generations. On Monday we honored the Queen of Funk, Chaka Khan. On Wednesday it was the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin. Today it’s the boss, Diana Ross; and on Friday, the…
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How These Former Inmates Are Fighting for Prison Reform
Yusef “Bunchy” Shakur, Shaka Senghor and Chris Wilson are activists, community leaders and businessmen. They are also among the formerly incarcerated. The three are speaking out about their journey from prison to prosperity and why the American justice system needs to move away from mass incarceration and more toward rehabilitation and reform. Their efforts as…
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A Young Black Man Is Dead—So Why Are They Talking About the Maserati He’s Driving?
Father. Son. Unarmed. Employee. The press could have chosen to use any of those descriptors in detailing how police shot a 25-year-old Georgia man outside his job at Goodyear Tire. Instead, countless headlines included the fact that a young black man was in a Maserati at the time of his death. Here’s what we know:…
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Being Mary Jane Recap: ‘One Last Question’
A welcome change is on the horizon for Mary Jane Paul. When Sheldon calls while she’s microwaving cordon bleu (of course she lies and says she was cooking it), the two have one of those early “getting to know you” sessions where people ask each other all kinds of questions, like, “Malcolm or Martin?” Sheldon…
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What Was That About Black People Not Being Able to Swim?
It was an unprecedented event for NCAA swimming. It was as symbolic as it was historic in that it provided a revealing reality concerning the sport of swimming and marked the official introduction of African-American women as a force in an arena that has failed to attract or embrace them in the past. It was…
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R-E-S-P-E-C-T the Queen: 10 Times Aretha Franklin Stole the Show
Editor’s note: This week we’re celebrating the birthdays of phenomenal performers who not only share late-March birthdays but who also have voices that have defined their generations. On Monday we honored the Queen of Funk, Chaka Khan. Today it’s the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin. Then, on Thursday, it’s the boss, Diana Ross, and on Friday, the…
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George Zimmerman Says God and Justice Are on His Side
If the moral arc of the universe really did bend toward justice, I would be reporting on George Zimmerman’s incarceration for one of the numerous crimes he’s committed since he gunned down unarmed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin on that rainy night in Sanford, Fla. Instead he’s in the news for a disturbing interview in which he…
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I’m a White Mom With Biracial Children, and What I Do With Their Hair Is No One’s Business
Maybe I’m just not the type of parent who likes unsolicited advice or people getting in my personal space, but one of the things that I’ve noticed about parenting a mixed-race child is that the general public seems to have no boundaries. When you become a mother, you notice that the boundaries people usually have…