history

  • Quote of the Day: James Baldwin on Children

    Read more about James Baldwin here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. 

  • Quote of the Day: W.E.B. Du Bois on Race

    Read the full quote here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. 

  • Quote of the Day: Hank Aaron

    Read the full quote here and check out more of The Root’s coverage of Hank Aaron here.   Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him…

  • Quote of the Day: Frederick Douglass on Africa

    Read more of The Root’s Frederick Douglass coverage here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. 

  • What Is Juneteenth?

    Editor’s note: For those who are wondering about the retro title of this black history series, please take a moment to learn about historian Joel A. Rogers, author of the 1934 book 100 Amazing Facts About the Negro With Complete Proof, to whom these “amazing facts” are an homage. (The Root) — Amazing Fact About…

  • Quote of the Day: James Baldwin on Africa

    Read more about James Baldwin here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. 

  • DNA Test: 'Unknown' Ancestry?

    (The Root) — “I was recently diagnosed with an uncommon autoimmune disease called Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada (VKH) syndrome, which is found in Asians, Mediterranean people and Native Americans. I am African American. I had my DNA tested via Ancestry.com’s AncestryDNA test and was told that I was 68 percent West African, 25 percent Central European and the…

  • Quote of the Day: Claude Brown

    Read the full quote here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. 

  • Quote of the Day: Howard Thurman

    Read more about Howard Thurman here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. 

  • Quote of the Day: Ralph Ellison on Culture

    Read more from Ralph Ellison here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.