By Stella M Flores, The Conversation — On July 3, the Trump administration announced it will reverse several policy memos outlining how colleges and universities can use race as a factor in admissions. The memos aren’t law, but rather Obama-era guidance – issued jointly by the departments of Education and Justice – stating that the federal government recognizes “the compelling interest that postsecondary institutions have in obtaining the benefits that flow from achieving a…
As Trump highlights declining jobless figures, Kansas City offers a window into how the recovery has passed many African Americans by. By Caleb Gayle, The Guardian — Kansas City is booming. Employers and investors have poured into the midwestern city since the recession. At least $1bn has gone into its sparkling new downtown, revitalized arts district and shiny new condos. So why is Sly James, its highly regarded outgoing mayor, so…
By Allison Skinner, The Conversation — According to the most recent U.S. census, approximately 15 percent of all newlywed couples are interracial. More interracial relationships are also appearing in the media – on television, in film and in advertising. These trends suggest that great strides have been made in the roughly 50 years since the Supreme Court struck down anti-miscegenation laws. But as a psychologist who studies racial attitudes, I suspected that attitudes toward interracial couples may…
Ever since his “It’s not like I’m black, you know?” comment, Neymar has served as a focal point in Brazil’s cultural reckoning with racism, whitening, identity and public policy. By Cleuci de Oliveira, New York Times — Years before he became the most expensive player in the world; before his Olympic gold medal; before the Eiffel Tower lit up with his name to greet his professional move from Barcelona to…
In one of the wealthiest US cities, the racial disparity in birth outcomes is stark: ‘Why isn’t this sounding a bigger alarm?’ By Leslie Casimir, The Guardian — Jasmine Ball was barely five months pregnant with twins when the labor pains jolted through her lower body. Rushed to the hospital, the doctors told her that her cervix had dilated completely. There was nothing they could do to stop the babies…
Black people experience discrimination every day – it’s knowledge inaccessible to white people and, when confronted with it, most are incredulous. By Elijah Anderson, The Guardian — Almost every black person in America has experienced the sting of disrespect on the basis of being black. A large but undetermined number of black people feel acutely disrespected in their everyday lives, discrimination they see as both subtle and explicit. Black folk…
The routine suppression of black voters is far-reaching and has devastating consequences. We cannot be silent about it. By Carol Anderson, The Guardian — The recent spate of whites calling 911 on African Americans for barbecuing while black, waiting in Starbucks while black, sleeping at Yale while black ad nauseum has led to a much-needed discussion about the policing of public spaces. Yet, there’s another important public space where blackness has been policed and we have…
By Charles M. Blow, The New York Times — Racist comments don’t hurt my feelings. Not at all. However, I find that people assume that they are hurtful, both the persons spewing them and those empathic about the perceived pain. But I register no such pain. I’m from the Toni Morrison school of morality on the subject of race. As she once told Charlie Rose: “I always knew…
By Ryan Cooper, The Week — If you want to get a good measure of the intense racial segregation of Washington, D.C., just head southeast on the Green Line subway around 5 p.m. Once that train leaves the L’Enfant Plaza station, it will reflect the demographic fact that east of the Anacostia River, the city is overwhelmingly black. This sort of thing is not at all uncommon. Indeed, a recent study…
By Westenley Alcenat, AAIHS — In hindsight, historians of American immigration will be pressed to name the first two decades of the twenty-first century as one dominated by the systematic “racial exclusionism” of non-Europeans. It was in the United States that the modernization of racial difference perfected the models for global settler colonialism. America’s career and success in expropriating Native American land was globalized for latecomers like Germany in the scramble for…
The latest from the legendary filmmaker, which made its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, features a David Duke character who sounds awfully familiar to Donald Trump. By Richard Porton, The…
By Rochaun Meadows-Fernandez, Truthout — Institutional racism caused me to have a medical emergency a month after giving birth to my son. The emergency was entirely preventable. Following the birth,…