13 Search results for "middle passage"

Trump celebrates the passage of oppressive tax bill, liberals respond
The White House and its GOP conspirators are cheering the passing of a bill which many experts have warned will only benefit those who are at the top of the American tax brackets, worsening the economic outlook of the (working) poor and middle class. White-folk-President has already hailed his plan as the “largest tax cut” […]
Anti-Blackness knows no borders: How nation-centric understandings of Blackness fails us
Dalvin Aboagye Near the end of May, the more melanin-infused parts of the internet were set ablaze by a questionable scene in the second season of She’s Gotta Have It, the Spike Lee-produced Netflix series based on his 1986 film of the same name. Within what many already saw as a weak portrayal of Black […]
‘Seeking for the Lost’ and the project of finding each other as a misplaced people
by Donnie Moreland “We hummed a celebration for living. For fighting. For refusing to die. For enduring when giving up would be easier. For believing, against all odds, that we’d get home someday.” —The Coming; Daniel Black “It’s nothing like losing one’s keys. It’s not as if he has been misplaced. It’s not as simple […]
On being a Black cynic when the world’s laughter is so loud
by Donnie Moreland There is an old adage, from Black folk, which goes as follows, “We laugh to keep ourselves from crying.” It is strange that such a crudely simple sentiment could provide such a weighted testament to the trepidations, and fears, of an entire people. And yet I can think of very few words […]
Review Roundup: Zora Neale Hurston’s book on one of the last Africans in the Atlantic slave trade
Nearly 90 years after it was first written, Zora Neale Hurston’s series of interviews with one of the last Africans brought to America from the Atlantic slave trade has arrived in bookstores across the country. Barracoon is introduced rather fittingly by Alice Walker, the woman whom we can thank for a revitalized interest and scholarship […]
Call me Akata: Reclaiming our birthright as Indigenous and African people born on American soil
by Chelsea Neason In 1964, Malcolm X made history with “The Ballot or the Bullet”. With this speech, he proclaimed a bone-shaking truth: Black people born in America are not Americans. In Detroit, MI during one of the most impactful decades of visible Black resistance in the United States, Malcolm declared: “We are Africans, and […]
Welcome to Wakanda: ‘Black Panther’ is a love letter between the African Diaspora and the continent
I’m wondering what words there are in existence that could be used to accurately describe Black Panther. Stunning, breathtaking, and majestic come close. This film stands firmly in a class all its own. It is not perfect (and I have many feelings about it, but you won’t find any spoilers here), but it is still […]
‘Thor: Ragnarok’ through a Black and Indigenous post-colonial lens
by Briana L. Ureña-Ravelo Warning: Spoilers up ahead! After months of anticipation, I finally saw Thor: Ragnarok and I was not in the least bit disappointed. Taika Waititi is the Indigenous Maori director, writer, actor, and comedian who made sure Indigenous people, jargon, humor, culture, and anti-colonial messaging was prominent throughout the movie, and who made […]
On the Very Real Possibility of a Super Bowl Conspiracy
By Summer McDonald Among the collective gasps, OMGs, and guttural expressions of utter shock from seasoned 12s and Seahawks bandwagon riders alike after Russell Wilson threw an axis-altering interception in last Sunday’s Super Bowl, was some version of this question: Why in the world did they not give the ball to Marshawn Lynch? Since […]
..Because I was a Black Kid: Affirmative Action and Acceptance into a Top Tier University
This year the News and world report university rankings came out and my facebook page filled up with the responses to the list of “top universities.” My University placed higher than it ever had before, 4th place, and made my classmates feel as though their academic rigor was finally being recognized. However, I didn’t and […]
Like A Gena 6 (Is the world on the same page with Black folks?)
Oh no! The folks back home will never stop smacking their lips over this one. As African American Studies grows across the nation, its scholarly diversity does not fall behind. Could white professors be added to the “things keeping Black people down” list? Possibly, but the fall of Black academia shouldn’t be instantly expected. Many […]
The New Trap: Death
We are living in that twenty-first century… Suicidal bombings, Dark Knight’s Joker, Kid Cudi and Kanye West black rose pop music display the new relationships to death. It was death that kept the powerless from doing whatever they pleased; think about “crime,” we approached it slowly, in fear of either real death—execution—or social death, getting […]