culture
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These Blackity-Black Productions Will Be Coming to Your Screen in 2018
This year we have seen the magic that unfolds when black people have full control of their own art. From Get Out to Insecure, black writers, producers and directors have exemplified that the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice. And they aren’t finished! I would recommend clearing your schedules, because 2018 is stacked with…
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Watch: Playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins on Race’s Importance in Narratives
“It blew my mind the first time I saw a black character on an HBO show that wasn’t in jail. Diversity is important because the world is diverse.” —Branden Jacobs-Jenkins Branden Jacobs-Jenkins was recognized on The Root 100 this year for his work changing narratives through the theatrical arts. In 2016, Jacobs-Jenkins was awarded a…
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Don’t Sleep! Gifts for the Newly Woke on Black (AF) Friday
Let’s just keep it real: The newly converted, whether they be Muslims or Masons, AKAs or vegans … can be totally exasperating when they see “the light.” In the case of the freshly woke, that light is noire, and it manifests in tried-and-true platitudes like, “Black is beautiful,” “Natural hair is fabulous” or “Resistance is…
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The Caucasian’s Guide to Black Thanksgiving, Part 3: Giving Thanks
Dearly beloved white people, Today we are gathered here among our cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews to celebrate the tradition called Black Thanksgiving. We have already informed you about the invited guests, so you should be familiar with all of the people in attendance. Black Thanksgiving is a holiday based on family and love,…
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Put Some Respeck on It (and Some Frank’s Red Hot): Isn’t It Time We Celebrate Chitlins?
My extended family has a text thread that we use to stay in touch. Last week, the subject of Thanksgiving came up and we started talking about our respective menu plans. Of course, we all agreed on the basics: dressing, mac and cheese and sweet potato pie. Those dishes have been part of our collective…
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The Caucasian’s Guide to Thanksgiving, Part 2: The Menu
Welcome back, white people! (I bet you’ve never heard anyone say that before.) After learning about the guest list for Black Thanksgiving, you might be wondering why Black Thanksgiving is so different from wypipo Thanksgiving. As you learn more about Thanksgiving, many of you will say: “This is almost exactly like white Thanksgiving, but not…
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6 Ways to Make Your Thanksgiving as Unproblematic as Possible
Ah, Thanksgiving. Everyone’s favorite official-yet-unofficial holiday. Retailers don’t really know what to do with it, since they tend to jump from a Halloween marketing blitzkrieg straight into Christmas marketing overexposure, but that doesn’t matter right now. All that matters is that Thanksgiving is that in-between holiday that chiefly exists for us to nearly and unabashedly…
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Transgender Woman Spent 10 Years Inside Men’s Prisons and Is Fighting to Make Sure That Never Happens to Another Woman
A few weeks ago, in the buildup of the travesty-shamockery that was the Floyd Mayweather Jr.-vs.-Conor McGregor fight, the great boxing analyst Teddy Atlas was forced to vamp on ESPN as cameras showed a McGregor workout. Although I could listen to Teddy Atlas read a phone book or, even worse, Taylor Swift lyrics, he left…
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An Open Letter to Post Malone
Dear Mr. Malone: First let me say that, as an old-school hip-hop head, I will refrain from criticizing your music. I will not comment on your lyrical genius of rhyming “shottas” with “grrra-ta-ta-ta.” I won’t even mention how your synthesized, Auto-Tuned, Caucasian half-singing on “Rockstar” sounds as if T-Pain fucked a Pinterest page. I am…
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The Caucasian’s Guide to Black Thanksgiving, Part 1: The Guest List
As part of The Root’s ongoing efforts to satisfy the curiosity of our Caucasian constituency, we have decided to give you a peek inside some of the cultural customs of black America. One of the oldest and most heralded traditions of the African-American community is the ceremony known as Black Thanksgiving. Black Thanksgiving has nothing…