history
Racism, Not Hoodies: The Real Menace to Society
Three years ago today, Trayvon Martin was murdered for no other reason than being a Black male. As much as detractors try to play up ambiguities in that night’s circumstance or justify George Zimmerman’s actions, we know what it was about. The criminalization of Black men by our society has embedded an innate fear in […]
History of Lynchings in the South Documents Nearly 4,000 Names
An updated report on the brutal history of lynching and white terrorism experienced by Blacks in America. A block from the tourist-swarmed headquarters of the former Texas School Book Depository sits the old county courthouse, now a museum. In 1910, a group of men rushed into the courthouse, threw a rope around the neck of […]
Reclaiming ALL of Black History
You cannot add a “but” onto Black Lives Matter. You can’t align yourself to a multi-faceted, all-inclusive movement and still carry prejudices that put you at odds with it’s leaders. You can’t claim to want to fight against white supremacy while harboring the exact patriarchal, misogynist, homophobic, hetero-normative beliefs that characterize their oppression. While Black […]
Why its Hard to Celebrate MLK Day
I am a freelance writer and I have work with a client most of today, Martin Luther King day. I won’t be able to attend any municipal events or view any tributes on television. I don’t have a television anyway, and I’m actually kind of glad I won’t be able to partake in America’s charade. […]
The Montgomery Boycott and the Erasure and White Wash of Black Women
On this day in 1955, Rosa Parks helped spark a movement that would change this country forever. Yet, 59 years later Blacks continue to fight, bleed and sweat for their civil rights and humanity in this country. 59 years later, the same white supremacy that violated the rights and bodies of Black folk, is responsible […]
A Glimpse into Black Art
It was Sonia Sanchez who said, “The black artist is dangerous. Black art controls the “Negro’s” reality, negates negative influences, and creates positive images.” Black contemporary art has met resistance from the white dominated art world. An arena that limited itself from a diverse aesthetic of culture and vibrancy. Galleries of “white walls, with white […]
234: What Does it Take to be #1?
If it didn’t happen to African girls, would it be the world’s biggest story? Two-hundred and thirty four teenage girls were abducted from the Government Girls Secondary School in the northeastern town of Chibok, Nigeria. Gunmen from the Islamist militant group, Boko Haram raided the secondary school the night of April 14th, packing the students […]
African Americans and the Labor Movement
The Black Labor movement has remained in the shadows of the Civil Rights and Black Power movements. The erasure of the labor unions role in civil rights is most apparent when The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom Unions is simply referred to as the March on Washington. However, Black membership played an important […]
Point to Your Land and I’ll Point to Mine
Point to your land and I’ll point to mine. Our land was stolen. We had 200 acres of land in Linden, Alabama. My ancestors became very wealthy growing cotton and corn for the market place. My great great grandfather, Richard Howard (Cherokee) was killed by a group of European settlers around the 1870’s in […]
The Truth About Slavery and African Resistance
Mary Prince in her narrative declared, “All slaves want to be free” and states, “I can tell by myself what other slaves feel, and by what they have told me. The man that says slaves be quite happy in slavery – that they don’t want to be free – that man is either ignorant or […]