Race-Talk: Putting this Year of “Firsts” in Perspective

Written by Race-Talk’s Kira Hudson Banks.
I know the Oscars happened a week ago, but I’m still nagged by some of the larger implications of the event. The general controversy has been covered here and elsewhere. What I would like to do is highlight the limited scope of people of color throughout the history of the [...]

Book Recommendation: Root and Branch

What:  Root and Branch: Charles Hamilton Houston, Thurgood Marshall, and the Struggle to End Segregation by Rawn James, Jr.
The Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education is widely considered a seminal point in the battle to end segregation, but it was in fact the culmination of a decades-long legal campaign. Root and Branch [...]

Which One Are You?

Several news outlets have reported on a new study from Black Entertainment Television (BET) Networks – who knew they conducted studies?   “African Americans Revealed,” is a study of more than 80,000 African-American consumers over an 18-month span broken down into several individual research reports.  The report findings include a segmentation study, which revealed that African-Americans [...]

Family Remains Key to Cultural Identity After 18

Mom and dad will be happy.  Even after children turn 18, they still cling to the cultural traditions and learnings from their youth.  Cultural education remains a key facet of parenting.
According to a new study from San Francisco State University,
The formative years don’t stop at 18 according to a new study that found the actions [...]

Book Recommendation: Wrong Place, Wrong Time

What: Wrong Place, Wrong Time: Trauma and Violence in the Lives of Young Black Men by John A. Rich
Why: In a book review for the Washington Post, columnist Colbert I. King writes:
The shooting of a young black male doesn’t make the front page. It’s most likely to appear inside the Metro section — that is, [...]

Sites We Like: Avoice Online Virtual Library Project

What:  The Avoice (African American Voices in Congress) web site is designed to capture and preserve the rich history of political and legislative contributions of blacks for future generations. This virtual online library is a central source of information about historical and contemporary African American policy issues important to researchers, academics, educators and students.
Why:  Those of [...]

Obama’s Speech in Remembrance of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Worth reading in its entirety:
Remarks by President Barack Obama in Remembrance of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Vermont Avenue Baptist Church
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Good morning.  Praise be to God.  Let me begin by thanking the entire Vermont Avenue Baptist Church family for welcoming our family here today.  It feels like a family.  Thank you for [...]

Haiti on My Mind

Catastrophic doesn’t begin to describe the Haiti earthquake’s devastation on a country already ravaged by poverty.  Haiti is one of the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, if not the world.  I can’t bear to watch the news footage or see the pictures of destruction without doing something to help.  I encourage you to do so [...]

Of Coloreds, Negros, Blacks, and African Americans

Senator Harry Reid’s (D-NV) “poor word choice” and a mini uproar on the use of the word Negro on the upcoming U.S. Census forms has me thinking about black folks and name changes.  I swear we have to be the most-renamed population in America. 
One of my favorite quotes is from W.C. Field’s in which he [...]

Sites We Like: BlackYouthProject.com

What: The Black Youth Project, recently featured on ABC News,  is a national research project out of the University of Chicago that examines the attitudes, resources, and culture of African American youth ages 15 to 25, exploring how these factors and others influence their decision-making, norms, and behavior in critical domains such as sex, health, [...]

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