culture
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Empire Recap: Spilling the Tea, Slinging the Mud and Out for Blood
After giving Lucious (the only man she’s ever been with!) a taste of what he’s been missing, Cookie tells him, “If you want Cookie’s nookie, ditch the bitch.” Cookie is so poetic, Nikki Giovanni wants her lines. Lucious vows to get rid of Boo Boo Kitty. The man is clearly Lyon. Cookie wants to immortalize her ex…
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Reach: Showing Young Black Men a Path to Hope
Two years ago, Ben Jealous and Trabian Shorters had an idea: Young black men needed to hear from other black men about their struggle, their triumphs, their pain and their successes. “Our young men might imitate what they do see, but they definitely won’t imitate what they don’t see,” Jealous, 42, and the former…
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10 Ways How to Get Away With Murder Has Shaken Up Our Lives
As we gear up for the highly anticipated, two-hour season 1 finale of How to Get Away With Murder, let’s look back at some of the ways in which HTGAWM’s freshman season has shaken up the cultural landscape: 1. With the addition of HTGAWM to ABC’s existing Thursday-night lineup of Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal, Thursday nights officially became the property of Shonda Rhimes. #TGIT…
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16 Womanly Wisdoms for My 16-Year-Old Daughter
I am the daughter of Marie. The granddaughter of Mildred. The great-granddaughter of Ida. The great-great-granddaughter of Lula Mae. The niece of Virginia, Barbara and Janet. The object of affections showered by no fewer than 10 church mothers who smiled encouragement during my garbled Easter recitations and put daintily folded dollar bills in my patent…
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Journey of You: Marshawn Evans' Rise to 'Godfidence'
Marshawn Evans Daniels calls herself a “reinvention strategist” for good reason. She has reinvented herself a thousand times over. International baton-twirling champion. Lawyer. Runner-up in the Miss America competition. Contestant on The Apprentice. Public-speaking coach. And so on and so on. For the past several years, through several business ventures under her ME Unlimited consulting…
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Being Mary Jane Recap: A Drink a Day Will Not Keep MJ’s Problems Away
All hell breaks loose between Mary Jane and Niecy. The ingrate niece has lost her mind, checking Mary Jane about her drinking habits while living in her house rent-free. M.J. is pretty insufferable, but Niecy is lucky a clap-back was all she received from her aunt. Niecy reconnects with baby daddy No. 1, Cameron, who…
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A Horror Story of Modern Slavery and the Power of a Son’s Love
Stereotypes are tricky things. When artists play with stereotypes, it is often difficult to tell if the stereotypes are being subverted or simply affirmed; one might set out to do one and end up doing the other. In James Hannaham’s sophomore novel, Delicious Foods, we are met with plenty of stereotypes that have been layered…
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What Lucious Lyon Has Taught Terrence Howard About the Man He Can Be
Terrence Howard is back on television and loving every minute of it. The man who is as well-known for his tremendous acting ability (The Butler, Ray, Hustle & Flow, The Best Man, Pride) on-screen as he is for his difficult life offscreen is back on the small screen as Lucious Lyon, the patriarch of a…
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We Need a New ‘Straight A’ Strategy to Bridge the Digital Divide
Black History Month provides Americans an opportunity to celebrate our successes as a nation, reflect on what might have been and begin to craft a more inclusive future. Recent reports about the paucity of minority professionals in tech are all the more devastating because today’s underemployment has its roots in our collective failure to prepare…
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What to Do When Hip-Hop Profanity Comes Out of Your Baby’s Mouth
I fell in love with hip-hop in the 1980s. I remember sneaking up to my older sister’s room, blasting the Sugar Hill Gang and Afrika Bambaataa, Kool Moe Dee and Grandmaster Flash. There were also the nights—cousins standing guard at the door—that we giggled and gasped our way through 2 Live Crew’s As Nasty as…