reparations
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Safe Space: Black Imagination Offers a Necessary Respite From the Onslaught of Black Trauma
“A safe world, in my opinion, would be one where other humans are not an existential threat. Love and value would have to fall in line for such a world to exist.” — William Wallace III, Philadephia, Penn. text This is the sobering half-wish offered on page 57 of Black Imagination, an amalgamation of black…
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Ben Carson Emerges from the Sunken Place to Opine on Reparations, Dismiss Trump’s Impeachment as ‘Very Immature’
Ben Carson, whom award-winning author Kiese Laymon affectionately refers to as “Dad”, whom The Root Senior Editor Stephen Crockett Jr. refers to as “the Godfather of Mumble Rap,” and who I habitually refer to as “ain’t shit,” has a few questions about how this whole reparations thing is supposed to work. On Monday’s edition of…
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Revolution, Reparations, Revelry: The Root’s Black (AF) Gift Guide 2019
The theme from last year’s Black AF Gift Guide was self-care; in 2017, it was about being woke. This year, we’re talking “Revolution, Reparations, and Revelry,” because we like alliteration, and because these three go together like greens, yams, and ham (turkey ham, if you don’t swill swine. If you don’t eat meat, please pass).…
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Reparations Reminds Us That There Is Still Plenty Left Unsaid
“Reparations” is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as “the making of amends for a wrong one has done, by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged.” It is defined by black folk as any number of possibilities: free education, free health care, 40 acres and a mule. It is fitting…
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Georgetown Sets Goal to Raise $400,000 to Fund Reparations for Descendants of Those It Enslaved, but Effort’s Getting the Side Eye From Student Activists
When Georgetown University students voted this spring to use student fees to pay reparations to descendants of the enslaved people Georgetown sold to keep its doors open in the 1800s, they made headlines in what’s become a national conversation on how to repay a very real debt owed to African Americans. But student activists at…
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New Poll Finds Majority of (White) Americans Oppose Cash Reparations for Slavery
A slim majority of white Americans agree that hundreds of years of chattel slavery continue to impact African Americans to this day; however, only 15 percent of them support reparations to redress this damage, according to a recent poll. According to the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll, just under a third of…
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WWJD: Princeton Theological Seminary Announces $27 Million Reparations Plan
It is, to date, the largest monetary commitment of its kind: a $27 million commitment from Princeton Theological Seminary for scholarships and other initiatives to redress the institution’s long, tangled history with slavery. But campus-based advocates say the pledge, announced last Friday, is just a starting point. The New Jersey seminary, not affiliated with Princeton…
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Are Only Black American Descendants of US Slaves Deserving of Reparations?
With the nation’s renewed focus on whether or how to compensate black Americans for the evils of generations of chattel slavery in the U.S. and its systemically racist aftermath, some have questioned who should qualify for reparations should such reparative justice come to pass. William “Sandy” Darity, a Duke University economics professor and longtime proponent…