culture
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Joe Madison Arrested in NY Protest Against Injustice in South Sudan
Radio personality and activist Joe Madison was arrested Thursday outside the United Nations after a protest against human rights abuses in South Sudan. Madison was among three people arrested after the protest, which was held at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, before the group walked to the Ugandan Mission—where the South Sudan Mission is co-located—demanding reconciliation and…
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Teleka Patrick Drowned, 2nd Autopsy Confirms
A second autopsy of 30-year-old Kalamazoo doctor Teleka Patrick confirmed the previous autopsy’s conclusion that she had died of asphyxia from drowning, a private investigator hired by Patrick’s family told the news website MLive. Jim Carlin, the investigator, told the news site that he attended the second autopsy, which was conducted Friday at the Marion…
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Belafonte, MLK Estate Settle Document Suit
Harry Belafonte and the Martin Luther King Jr. estate have settled a lawsuit on terms that allow Belafonte to keep several documents he acquired during his friendship with the civil rights leader, the Associated Press reports. The singer sued the estate in Manhattan federal court in October to establish rights to certain documents, The Root…
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Kansas Shooting Suspect ID’d as Former KKK Leader
A 73-year-old man accused of killing three people at Jewish facilities near Kansas City is a former Ku Klux Klan leader, NBC News reports, citing law enforcement officials. Frazier Glenn Cross Jr. of Aurora, Mo., allegedly shot and killed a 14-year-old Eagle Scout and his grandfather in a parking lot at the Jewish Community Center…
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LaShanda Armstrong: A Horrible Act, but Not a Horrible Person
Under an ombré sky on April 11, 2011, just before 8 p.m., LaShanda Armstrong drove her minivan into the dark, still-chilly waters of the Hudson River in New York. The decision to end her life—and the lives of her four small children in the car—seemed to be born more from consuming desperation than methodical malice.…
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‘Regular Black’ vs. ‘Ethnic Black’: Why the Divide?
I first heard someone at a black student union party refer to herself—and to me, by extension—as a “regular black.” The music had made a quick turn from the latest rap song to a Caribbean dancehall mix. “Oh, I’m regular black; I don’t dance to this music.” Well, this “regular black” continued dancing, but I…
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How an HBCU Prepared Me for Harvard
As a Harvard School of Education graduate, I was elated and moved to see the global conversation that the creators of the recent I, Too, Am Harvard and Being Black at the University of Michigan campaigns sparked about the experience of underrepresented groups on college campuses, including the one where I earned my master’s degree. There’s no…
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Quilted Map Memorializes Chicago Homicide Victims
By now, the nation is familiar with the Chicago’s outsize homicide rate. But it was laid bare in startling detail on a 4-foot-by-6-foot piece of fabric as part of a project called “Untitled (Homicide Quilt),” a quilted map of Chicago with the names of each of the city’s homicide victims from last year stitched into…
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Man in Superman Hoodie Helps Save Baby From East Dallas Fire
A man wearing a Superman hoodie helped save a baby from an East Dallas apartment fire, according to NBCDFW. Tori Phillips, a big fan of the superhero, reportedly urged a couple trapped in their apartment to toss their little one to the safety of his arms. Although hesitant at first, they eventually dropped the infant…