“When I look at that dress and how much intention went into the making of it…it’s like we want to have something that can’t be destroyed, because so much of the past has been destroyed…”
black history
Posted inBooks, History, Nonfiction, Story, Unapologetic Women
A Minor Figure
While searching for photographs that depict black young women and girls living free in the second and third generations born after slavery, Saidiya Hartman finds a disturbing image.
Posted inNonfiction
‘They Happen To Be Our Neighbors Across the Span of a Century, But They’re Our Neighbors.’
One hundred summers ago, black Chicagoans were terrorized by whites during the Red Summer. Poet Eve Ewing talks about reaching out to her neighbors across time in “1919.”
Posted inBooks, History, Nonfiction, Story, Unapologetic Women
The Thrill (and the Heavy Emotional Burden) of Blazing a Trail for Black Women Journalists
Dorothy Butler Gilliam remembers how exciting it was to integrate The Washington Post, but also how lonely — and often attacked — she felt as the first black woman reporter in the newsroom.
Posted inBooks, History, Nonfiction, Story
Decolonizing Knowledge: Stefan Bradley on the Fight for Civil Rights in the Ivy League
In the 1960s, black students at the Ivies organized and protested for fair treatment, their personal safety, to create black studies programs, and to stop their universities from harming local black communities through expansion and urban renewal.
Posted inArts & Culture, Nonfiction, Quote Posts, Quotes
Working to Preserve Traditional Gospel Music
With approximately 75 percent of golden age gospel music lost, the Black Gospel Music Restoration Project is trying to save what’s left.
Posted inArts & Culture, Books, Quotes
Series Exhumes Out-of-Print Books by Black Authors
“The Blackist,” a column for Catapult’s magazine, introduces audiences to out-of-print novels written by black authors.
Posted inArts & Culture, Food, Highlight, Quotes
A Family’s Pear Pie Tradition Binds Them Together
A woman makes sand-pear pie with her grandmother and remembers a family ritual.
Posted inArts & Culture, Culture, Highlight, Profiles & Interviews, Quotes, Unapologetic Women
Zadie Smith on the Work and Influences of Deana Lawson
Lawson’s photographs capture the divinity and stateliness of its working-class subjects.
Posted inArts & Culture, Blog Post, Commentary, Culture, Current Events, Science & Nature, Unapologetic Women
Why Beyoncé Placed HBCU’s at the Center of American Life
The singer’s latest performance helps expand the possibilities of what it looks like to be a black thinking person.