culture

A 31-year-old Texas man has been sentenced to death for killing a teenage babysitter who accused him of rape. Franklin Davis admitted to shooting Shania Gray, 16, at a park in September 2012, then stepping on her throat to stop her breathing, the Dallas Morning News reports. Davis was set to stand trial on a…

The Best Man Holiday almost took down a Norse hammer-wielding god this weekend. In what has most Hollywood execs scratching their heads, a relationship movie starring an all-black cast almost unseated Thor: The Dark World for best at the box office, the Associated Press reports. The sequel, which was released 14 years after the original,…

Nelson Mandela is still unable to speak because of tubes that help keep his lungs clear of fluid, his former wife told the Sunday Independent and the Associated Press reports. According to Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, the former South African president is “quite ill,” although he is relaxed. She added that 22 doctors are treating him at…

We drove home in silence, and I could tell that it was killing my son. If I had gone full-blown-hand-waving-talking-through-gritted-teeth-just-wait-till-I-can-get-you-home crazy, I might have Iet slip what was in store for him, and I wasn’t about to let that happen. No, jail would have to be a surprise. Moms raising sons alone too often find…

As throngs of former collegiate wrestlers, contact sportsmen and current street fighters look to the new beacon of athletic hope that is mixed martial arts, one must recognize the shift in the talent pool. It is a shift that, although gradual, came from a place of desperation once the prospect or at least the perception…

The following is an excerpt of Charles M. Blow’s column from Sunday’s New York Times: “In an interview with the BBC this week, Oprah Winfrey said of President Obama: ‘There is a level of disrespect for the office that occurs. And that occurs, in some cases, and maybe even many cases, because he’s African-American.’ With that remark,…

There was once a family that hailed from beautiful Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The family was surprisingly stocked with boys who all seemed to walk to the pied piper movement of their father, a martial artist. However, his form of combative exercise was not atypical to his surroundings, which spawned the fighting dance of capoeira.…

Lauded British-African filmmaker John Akomfrah’s aesthetically captivating and poignant homage to Jamaican polymath, cultural theorist and British intellectual Stuart Hall is a real must-see, and one that I am all the richer for having seen. Currently showing as a multilayered video installation at Tate Britain for the next six months, this three-screen film montage is…

Mike Tyson is a walking, talking anomaly. People fitting the pedigree of the former heavyweight champion of the world rarely get to tell their side of the story. Their lives and tragic deaths are usually cautionary tales whispered by school teachers, guidance counselors and group-home workers to children in need of “straightening out.” At one time, he was…

Wow. Just wow. Last night’s episode of Scandal was packed with so many scream-worthy twists I’m sure most of you are hoarse. Today I can’t even whisper the word “gladiator” without feeling faint. Just when you thought Olivia Pope had the “My Family’s Secrets Are Worse Than Your Family’s Secrets” contest on lock, here comes…