Debunking Harmful Myths About Black Fatherhood

BY BLACK INFORMATION NETWORK

A prevailing stereotype about Black society is that most Black fathers aren’t there for their children. Despite plenty of data unraveling this falsehood, many Black fathers are still met with microaggressions and exaggerated praise for being present in their kids’ lives.

Luckily, there are people working every day to change how society looks at Black fathers. Before diving into their work, let’s check out the numbers that reflect the reality of Black fatherhood.

Statistics Debunk Common Misconceptions

The thought that most Black kids don’t have their fathers in their lives has been twisted by research. Government data, which found that 72% of Black children are born to unmarried mothers, tend to be the source of this idea. The issue is that this statistic doesn’t take into account several factors, as pointed out by The Chicago Reporter in 2019:

“Many fatherlessness statistics utilize marital and housing statuses as cornerstone metrics, resulting in highly inflated figures. These stats do not account for the fact that men have died or passed away, couples may live together while unmarried, couples may be divorced, and, let’s not forget, that, due to the system of incarceration, men are not only separated from their families but often even prevented from staying in the homes with their families if the housing is federally provided.”

Just a few years after that 72% statistic made its debut, the National Center for Health Statistics released a 2013 study revealing that most Black fathers live with their children compared to their white counterparts. The research also shows that Black dads tend to be more involved with their children’s lives, as well:Children under the age of 5: Black fathers prepared and/or ate meals more with their children compared to their white counterparts.

Children between 5 and 18: Black fathers took children to and from activities daily more than their white counterparts. They also helped their kids with homework more compared to white dads.

Black Dads Are Changing The Narrative

According to experts and advocates, one way to dismantle harmful stereotypes about Black fatherhood is to share more positive stories. Over the last few years, organizations and support groups have been popping up with the goal of rewriting the narrative about Black fatherhood.

One such example is The Dad Gang, which originally started with Sean Williams, a father of three, posting Instagram photos with his kids, according to The Washington Post. Eventually, he started highlighting more Black fathers he knew on his page. Williams later opened up the submissions to dads outside of his friend circle, and before he knew it, the page amassed over 86,000 followers. The Dad Gang is a community where Black fathers can connect, share their experiences, and help each other while tearing down the horrendous myths about them.

“For too many years, it’s been projected that all black fathers are not in their children’s lives,” Kevin Riley, a father of two and member of The Dad Gang, told reporters. “The Dad Gang has become more than a platform; it’s a support group.”

Then there’s the Baltimore-based Dads United Organization, which has gotten news coverage from the local level all the way to ABC News. Founded in 2015 by Michael Cornish, he says the purpose of the organization is to “educate, advocate, elevate and develop a strong community of Black fathers that are engaged in their neighborhoods by creating safe spaces for healing and bonding.”

While there is still much work to be done, Black fathers and other advocates are making moves to change how Black fathers are viewed in society.

READ ORIGINAL ARTICLE HERE

Teaching Black History Is About Exploring Black Humanity, Culture & Traditions, UB Education Expert Says

While lawmakers across the country take aim at how Black history is taught in schools – from dictating language (like avoiding words such as “diversity”) and banning books – educators are walking a tightrope trying to stay on top of it all, while still giving their students a complete picture of American and Black histories.

Black history is not just simply about racial history, says LaGarrett King, Ph.D., founder and director of the Center for K-12 Black History and Racial Literacy Education in the University at Buffalo’s Graduate School of Education. Black history and racial history are linked, salient concepts of Black history emerge through racial history. But, King said, “Black history is more than that. It is about exploring Black humanity, culture and traditions.”

A recent EdWeek Research Center survey reveals that a slight majority of educators are committed to finding ways to teach Black history, regardless of their state’s mandates and other obstacles. Still, teachers cited time constraints and lack of state requirements as challenges to teaching Black history. The political climate doesn’t help, either. King said that issues are limited when it comes to teaching Black history.

“Those topics usually center on slavery, reconstruction, and the civil rights movement,” he said.

State Mandates Lack Substance

According to King, there are currently only 12 states that have Black history mandates. Perhaps more surprising than this number is the weakness of their implementation.

“We have found that many of the mandates are superficial with no authority or accountability,” King explained.

So, what can be done to offset the anti-Black history rhetoric and loose implementation of mandates? This is where the Center for K-12 Black History and Racial Literacy Education plays a crucial and proactive role. The center hosts an annual Teaching Black History conference, which convenes hundreds of teachers from across the country to learn about best curricular and instructional practices surrounding Black history education.

"We host expert speakers and entertainment, but the stars of the conference are our teachers," King said. The 2023 conference takes place July 19-20 at UB. The theme is, “The Sounds of Blackness, Hip Hop Turns 50.”

The center is also working to create a microcredential in teaching Black history.

“The most important person in this endeavor is the teacher,” King said. “Most of these states do not provide education around Black history education. The microcredential is supposed to fill that void.”

‘It’s OK to Not See the US as Perfect’

King’s mission is to advocate for Black history and racial literacy education. The center seeks to help teachers and other educational entities expand opportunities to learn about crucial concepts related to Black history and race – concepts lawmakers are fiercely trying to suppress.

“When you truly teach through Black history or expose how systemic racism has influenced a racialized community, that narrative becomes messy. We are a historically immature society and seemingly cannot handle complexity and nuance,” King said. “We should be able to understand that everything is not Black and white. There is a lot of gray, and it is OK to not see the U.S. as perfect. I think students will appreciate that more.”

King said students are more intelligent than certain lawmakers think they are.

“My children have picked up on many complex things happening in the world, including racism and injustice,” he said.

The way King sees it, power and control are what’s really driving these new (and ongoing) attempts to limit exposure to a Black history education.

“It is about attempting to control students' thinking and their exposure. By doing that, we are putting all our children at a disadvantage, and we continue to hurt our so-called democracy,” King said. “We should not think about the curriculum as just a curriculum – we should be thinking of it in terms of a citizenship education.”

King added, “We do not live in a monocultural or monolingual world, so these children who will become decision-makers in the near future need to understand a society that not only includes persons that look like them. If we can teach about all folks, our country will become a better place.”

READ ORIGINAL STORY HERE

Who Gets To Be Abstract? A Legendary Show Of Black Artists Gets A Second Look In “Revisiting 5+1”

BY JASMINE LIU

In 1969 Stony Brook University was in dire straits. Having been rocked by anti-war protests, student demands for a Black studies program, and a drug raid on campus, the institution was under pressure to radically transform just over a decade after its founding. Amid these circumstances, the school invited British Guyanese artist Frank Bowling to curate an exhibition of works by Black artists, sponsored by a new “Afro-American Studies Program.” Bowling seized on the opportunity, later declaring that “young people clamoring for more and better Black studies” were its “natural audience.”

Bowling invited five African American artists—Melvin Edwards, Daniel LaRue Johnson, Al Loving, Jack Whitten, and William T. Williams—to join him in exhibiting work. The show’s title, “5+1,” gently set him apart as both the curator and the only non-American participant. Despite their disagreements about representational politics and their varying relationships with predominantly white gatekeeping institutions, the artists lamented the reigning expectation that Black artists should produce overtly political, figurative work. At the time, abstraction was often presumed to be the preserve of white artists with silver-spoon upbringings; prominent advocates like Clement Greenberg systematically overlooked Black artists. Bowling and his artists showcased their work at a time when major institutions were just beginning to work with Black artists, and they neither spoke directly to political questions of the day in the recognizable style of the Black Arts Movement (BAM) nor acted indifferent to the struggle to improve conditions for Black art. The exhibition demonstrated more indeterminate forms of expression to the same young students who were attending Black Students Union meetings, writing fiery op-eds, and participating in sit-ins.

Little survives from “5+1,” aside from the pamphlet and photographs of the lively opening by photographer and painter Adger Cowans. “Revisiting 5+1,” staged this winter at the Paul W. Zuccaire campus gallery at Stony Brook, is the result of assiduous research by professors and PhD candidates into the original exhibition, despite the archival gaps. A number of the original works have since been lost or destroyed, so the current show exhibits works by the same artists made around the late ’60s. It also incorporates work by women; Howardena Pindell curated a section that presents Black female artists active in the 1960s and ’70s who also created work largely out of step with BAM and struggled to receive recognition from major institutions.

Prominently featured in both the 1969 exhibition and “Revisiting 5+1” are similar barbed wire curtains by Edwards, hemmed at the bottom by lengths of rusted metal chain. Although their materials have associations with confinement and oppression, both works transform the severe wire and metal into a gossamer-like and playful architecture. In Cowans’s pictures, out-of-focus strands of wire often float harmlessly in the foreground of animated conversations between artists and friends, adding texture and a sense of leisure to the shots.

Other standout works include a large 1968 painting by Whitten that commands the exhibition with its infernal blood-orange hue. Layered with indeterminate forms, faint gestures evoking spray paint, and broad strokes and dripping splatters of oil, the canvas is energetic and chaotic, reflecting its turbulent times. Near Whitten’s canvas is an untitled Johnson painting (ca. 1969) on a tall wood panel showing an elongated, pyramidal shape composed of candy-colored vertical bands truncated before they reach their pinnacle. The central band is an intense yellow beam. The painting’s propulsive directionality, brought to an end ahead of its acme, might evoke thwarted intelligence and purpose. Alternatively, it encourages viewers to complete the mission on their own.

Pindell’s section encompasses a range of attitudes, mediums, and artistic concerns. Jabberwocky, a canvas from 1976–77 by activist artist Mary Lovelace O’Neal, is blackened with soot. Though O’Neal faced criticism for a lack of political messaging in her art, her use of color in this work is in fact socially powerful: at the time, soot and the color black were loaded with political and aesthetic meaning, with some artists regarding black as an important signifier of African American identity. Feeble lines of blue and pink peek through the charcoal, a formal gesture that O’Neal said was inspired by the “shot of light” that would pierce through “black spaces of flatness” in the sky of the Bay Area, where she lived. Elsewhere, a soft, sunny, semi-figural piece by Vivian Browne, painted after a 1971 trip to West Africa, likens the arch of a back to a dangling, especially ripe banana. Browne’s trip marked a turning point in her practice: inspired by the region’s vivid colors, textiles, and sculptures, she moved toward a more abstract style. Another gem in the show is Betye Saar’s Eyeball, a 2-minute film (an uncommon medium for Saar) featuring a procession of eyes mischievously close-cropped and edited to produce a haunting, depersonalized, atmosphere.

While “Revisiting 5+1” is exciting for its doubling of Bowling’s ambition, it also feels disconnected. Men and women are separated, and there is little discussion of how the original participants and newly included artists influenced and critiqued each other. Discussion of how the work of Black women abstract artists was further excluded and devalued in the late 20th century is limited to a catalogue essay.

In his essay for the 1969 exhibition, Bowling wrote, “The structure of Black life has revealed, over centuries, a creative, self-perpetuating process of anarchist, pro-life zeal which a study of the fine arts and history alone, though helpful, can never fully define.” Viewers might crave historical or sociopolitical referents for the diverse abstract gestures on display—could the breaks of light in O’Neal’s paintings represent the difficulty of individual expression amid prevailing demands on Black artists, or could Eyeball read as the repurposing of a surveilling gaze cast on Black women? In the end, these explanations prove to be contortions for justifying work that requires no such justification.

READ ORIGINAL ARTICLE HERE

INFLUENTIAL BLACK RIGHTS CASES IN COURT TV HISTORY

COURT TV

BY KATIE MCLAUGHLIN

On the third Monday of each January, America remembers Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a prominent civil rights leader in the fight against racial discrimination in both federal and state law.

In honor of Dr. King’s legacy, here’s a look back at some cases involving Black rights that Court TV has covered over the years, as well as some of the network’s reporting on legal stories that shaped Black history.

THE DEATH OF GEORGE FLOYD

On May 25, 2020, bystanders in Minneapolis captured cell phone video of police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on the neck of George Floyd during an arrest. Two other cops — Thomas Lane and J. Alexander Kueng — held Floyd down while a third, Tou Thao, attempted to keep horrified onlookers at bay.

Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd’s neck for 9 1/2 minutes, even though he said he couldn’t breathe. Floyd died there in the street.

All three former officers are currently behind bars, having been convicted of both criminal and federal charges. Chauvin faced the most serious charges, and is currently serving a 22 1/2 year state sentence for murder and manslaughter. He also received a 21-year federal sentence for civil rights violations, and will serve that sentence concurrently.

THE KILLING OF AHMAUD ARBERY

On February 23, 2020, Ahmaud Arbery was jogging in Brunswick, Georgia when he was chased by Gregory and Travis McMichael, who were in a truck. Neighbor William “Roddie” Bryan followed in his own truck and filmed the altercation.

The McMichaels, a father and son, boxed Arbery in with their truck while trying to make a citizen’s arrest. They thought Arbery was responsible for recent neighborhood break-ins.

Travis shot Arbery at close range with a shot gun. He collapsed and died in the street. Travis claimed it was self-defense.

The McMichaels and Bryan were all convicted of murder on the state level and all got life sentences. They were later convicted on federal hate crime charges with the McMichaels receiving life sentences and Bryan getting a 35 year sentence.

BREONNA TAYLOR BOTCHED RAID

In the early morning hours of March 13, 2020, Breonna Taylor was gunned down by officers executing a no-knock warrant in a narcotics investigation. When the cops kicked in the door to Taylor’s Louisville apartment, her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired his own legally-owned gun, believing the home was being broken into.

Two officers — Sgt. Jonathan Mattingly and Detective Myles Cosgrove — returned fire, striking Taylor, 26, who was standing in the hall with Walker when she was struck by eight bullets. Taylor, who was an EMT, bled to death. Walker was not harmed.

Another officer on the scene, Brett Hankison, was standing outside the apartment during the raid. None of Hankison’s bullets struck Taylor, but he did go on trial for charges unrelated to Taylor’s death, facing three counts of wanton endangerment for recklessly firing into a neighbor’s apartment. Hankison was found not guilty.

Mattingly and Cosgrove were not indicted. Their claim that they shot in self-defense was deemed justifiable because Walker fired first.

Additionally, it turned out that the narcotics investigation focused on an ex-boyfriend of Taylor’s who never lived at her address.

THE DEATH OF DAUNTE WRIGHT

On April 11, 2021, Minnesota police officer Kim Potter pulled Daunte Wright over for having an expired vehicle registration, as well as an air freshener hanging from his rear view mirror (Minnesota law prohibits motorists from hanging objects from rear view mirrors).

Potter soon learned Wright had an outstanding gross misdemeanor warrant. As she attempted to take Wright into custody, he got back in his car. Potter then shot Wright in the chest with her service weapon, which she claimed she mistakenly grabbed instead of her Taser.

Wright drove a short distance before colliding and dying at the scene. Potter was found guilty of first and second-degree manslaughter. She’s currently serving a two-year prison sentence.

THE BEATING OF RODNEY KING

Just after midnight on March 3, 1991, the savage beating of unarmed motorist Rodney King was caught on a bystander’s video camera. King, 27, had been speeding in Los Angeles and refused to pull over for cops.

He eventually stopped, and multiple police cars descended upon him. When King refused to lie on the ground, officers kicked, punched, Tased and attacked him with batons.

Four officers –Laurence Powell, Stacey Koon, Theodore Briseno, and Timothy Wind — were charged in connection with the beating. All four officers were tried for use of excessive force. All four were acquitted. Those not guilty verdicts kicked off the LA Riots. In their federal trial, however, Wind and Briseno were acquitted, while Powell and Koon were convicted of violating King’s rights and sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison.

THE KILLING OF AMADOU DIALLO

Just after midnight on February 4, 1999, plainclothes-cops shot at Amadou Diallo 41-times. The officers were members of the New York Police Department’s now-shuttered Street Crime Unit.

Diallo, 23, an immigrant from West Africa, was struck by 19 of those 41 bullets. He died on the stoop of his Bronx apartment building.

Officers Kenneth Boss, Sean Carroll, Richard Murphy, and Edward McMellon later admitted they mistook Diallo for a rape suspect. That said they believed Diallo was reaching for a gun when they fired their service weapons. Diallo was unarmed.

The officers were eventually found not guilty of his murder.

THE DEATH OF TRAYVON MARTIN: 10TH ANNIVERSARY LOOKBACK

Trayvon Martin, 17, was visiting his father in a gated Florida community in 2012. While walking home from a convenience store where he had purchased candy and iced tea, the unarmed teen was shot and killed in a physical altercation instigated by neighborhood watch member George Zimmerman, who was later acquitted of second-degree murder.

LANDMARK SUPREME COURT CASE: HEART OF ATLANTA MOTEL v. U.S.

In 1964, newly-enacted legislation prohibited discrimination in public spaces based on race, sex, color, religion, or national origin. The Heart of Atlanta Motel challenged that new law, and the Supreme Court rejected that challenge, ruling that Congress had the right to prohibit discrimination in public accommodations.

According to the high court, African-Americans were unfairly shut out from accommodations across the country. In short, the ruling stated that owners of public accommodations have no constitutional right to pick and choose their guests.

LANDMARK SUPREME COURT CASE: PLESSEY v. FERGUSON

Louisiana businessman Homer Plessey had one African-American grandparent, and was therefore Black in the eyes of the law. While traveling by train in 1892, Plessey refused to sit in a car for Black people, which was required by law in Louisiana at the time.

Upon his arrest, Plessey petitioned the Louisiana Supreme Court for a writ to stop trial court judge John H. Ferguson from going forth with proceedings. Plessey was convicted and appealed to the United States Supreme Court, arguing that the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause allowed him to sit where he wanted. The state argued that separating people by races ensured public safety.

In a 7-1 decision, the Supreme Court upheld Louisiana law, stating that as long as the accommodations were equal, the federal government could not interfere. Thus, “separate but equal” became law, upholding the constitutionality of racial segregation. That “separate but equal” doctrine was finally overturned 60 years later by Brown v. Board of Education in Topeka, KS in 1954.

BLACK AND BLUE: A COURT TV SPECIAL

This hour-long Court TV special took a deep dive into the criminal justice system’s history and relationship with African Americans.

Tupac Shakur Exhibit Extends Dates Through Summer 2022

The exterior of the 'Tupac Shakur: Wake Me When I'm Free' exhibition is seen at Canvas at L.A. LIVE in Los Angeles. Image: Rich Fury

BY WILL SCHUBE

The exhibit has also announced a new initiative to open its doors to students.

Due to popular demand, the groundbreaking Tupac Shakur “Wake Me When I’m Free” exhibit has extended its dates in Los Angeles through Summer of 2022.

Originally launched in January and scheduled to finish its Los Angeles run on May 1, the Shakur Estate-sanctioned exhibit has seen a slate of positive reviews and endorsements from celebrities, press and fans alike.

The exhibit has also announced a new initiative to open its doors to students, offering free tickets to any public school groups (grade school, middle school, high school) and their chaperones for the remainder of the exhibit’s time in Los Angeles. Visits must be scheduled in advance with the exhibit.

To kick off the initiative, Los Angeles Unified Superintendent Alberto M. Carvalho visited the museum experience with more than 70 students from across the district. Superintendent Carvalho, the exhibit’s Creative Director Jeremy Hodges, and Rob Light (Head of Worldwide Music, Partner & Managing Director of entertainment and sports agency CAA) participated in a discussion with students following the tour.

“Inspired, powerful, meaningful: These are just a few of the words our students used to describe the exhibit ‘Tupac Shakur: Wake Me When I’m Free’ after our visit,” Superintendent Carvalho said. “These students joined our test pilot for the Los Angeles Unified Cultural Arts Passport, a new program to provide all students with access to arts and cultural enrichment. I’m thrilled that the exhibit will extend its offer of free tickets to all public school student groups to visit and learn about Tupac Shakur’s life and legacy.”

Part museum, part art installation, part sensory experience, WMWIF showcases Shakur’s music, poetry, and never before seen artifacts in a 20,000 square foot curated space akin to a contemporary art museum. Guests transition through a myriad of surround sound spaces, rich with rarities embedded in technology.

WMWIF delves into the greater meaning of his activism, music, and revolutionary art. The attendees are educated and enlightened through a labyrinth of emotions as they take this journey through his extraordinary life.

WMWIF is a Shakur Estate sanctioned museum experience and produced in partnership with Round Room Live, CAA, Universal Music Group, and Kinfolk Management + Media. WMWIF is a creative collaboration led by Chief Curator & Vice President of Curatorial Affairs at The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Nwaka Onwusa and award-winning Creative Director Jeremy Hodges and his firm, Project Art Collective.

Jamestown To Jamestown: Commemorating 400 Years Of The African Diaspora Experience

Derrick Johnson. Image: NAACP

BY DERRICK JOHNSON

History commonly and most often points to late August in the year 1619 when some “20 and odd Negroes” originating from Angola arrived in the British colony of Jamestown, Virginia as the first documented enslaved Africans to land in what is now the United States. This nation and its wealth was built through forced labor and the very existence of Black men and women.

It’s truly ironic that as this country celebrates 400 years of democracy, the Black community is still fighting for equal rights, justice and freedom.

The century that followed emancipation saw the creation of policies that discriminated against black people and largely excluded them from wealth building, creating an inherited disadvantage for future generations. This is why the idea of reparations, brought forth during the Civil War era, has continued to be a topic of grave concern for the NAACP.

On a daily basis, we grapple with domestic terrorism and state sanctioned violence in the guise of white supremacy — all under the watch of one of the most racist administrations since the Jim Crow era. Along with his xenophobic policies, President Donald Trump is doing all he can to punish immigrants and alienate Black Americans, using hateful tweets and chants of “Send her back,” as a rallying cry for his base. At NAACP’s annual convention, our delegates voted unanimously to call on the House to begin impeachment proceedings against President Trump.

We can’t and won’t whitewash or glorify this experience — but it has made us stronger and more resilient than ever.

We know from the incredible Black voter turnout in the midterm elections that African-Americans are not only the most critical voting bloc, but the most powerful when we are encouraged to participate actively in our Democracy.

Next week, the NAACP, will embark on a historic and spiritual journal to commemorate the 400-year anniversary of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. More than 200 African-Americans will pay homage to the strength, power and resilience of our people.

In our journey from Jamestown, Virginia to Ghana, we will not only retrace the footsteps of our ancestors through the slave dungeons and along the shores where the enslaved had their last bath before their trek to the western world – we will also immerse ourselves in the vibrant culture and join leading government and business leaders to learn more about business, development and investment in Ghana.

Through this experience, we hope to actualize the healing and collective unity so many generations have worked to achieve in ways which bring power to our communities in America, Africa and throughout our Diaspora.

SOURCE: NEW YORK AMSTERDAM NEWS

The New York Times Launches The 1619 Project: RaceAhead

Nikole Hannah-Jones attends the 75th Annual Peabody Awards Ceremony on May 21, 2016, in New York City.Evan Agostini—Invision/AP

BY ELLEN MCGIRT
FORTUNE MAGAZINE

The New York Times Magazine has launched an extraordinary editorial project to mark the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in the British colony of Virginia. This project is wide-reaching and collaborative, unflinching, and insightful. Best of all, 1619-related coverage is planned throughout the entire New York Times platform.

The 1619 Project serves as a dramatic and necessary corrective to the fundamental lie of the American origin story. It begins with an essay by Nikole Hannah-Jones, the driving force behind the project, and one of the most extraordinary writers this country has produced.

What she has come to do is twofold. First, establish that the principles of liberty the founding fathers are famous for were false when written. And next, that the very people upon whose backs this country’s wealth was created have spent centuries working to make the country live up to them.

"The United States is a nation founded on both an ideal and a lie. Our Declaration of Independence, signed on July 4, 1776, proclaims that 'all men are created equal' and 'endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.' But the white men who drafted those words did not believe them to be true for the hundreds of thousands of black people in their midst. 'Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness' did not apply to fully one-fifth of the country. Yet despite being violently denied the freedom and justice promised to all, black Americans believed fervently in the American creed. Through centuries of black resistance and protest, we have helped the country live up to its founding ideals. And not only for ourselves—black rights struggles paved the way for every other rights struggle, including women’s and gay rights, immigrant and disability rights.

Without the idealistic, strenuous and patriotic efforts of black Americans, our democracy today would most likely look very different—it might not be a democracy at all."

The New York Times Magazine has launched an extraordinary editorial project to mark the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in the British colony of Virginia. This project is wide-reaching and collaborative, unflinching, and insightful. Best of all, 1619-related coverage is planned throughout the entire New York Times platform.

The 1619 Project serves as a dramatic and necessary corrective to the fundamental lie of the American origin story. It begins with an essay by Nikole Hannah-Jones, the driving force behind the project, and one of the most extraordinary writers this country has produced.

What she has come to do is twofold. First, establish that the principles of liberty the founding fathers are famous for were false when written. And next, that the very people upon whose backs this country’s wealth was created have spent centuries working to make the country live up to them.

"The United States is a nation founded on both an ideal and a lie. Our Declaration of Independence, signed on July 4, 1776, proclaims that 'all men are created equal' and 'endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.' But the white men who drafted those words did not believe them to be true for the hundreds of thousands of black people in their midst. 'Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness' did not apply to fully one-fifth of the country. Yet despite being violently denied the freedom and justice promised to all, black Americans believed fervently in the American creed. Through centuries of black resistance and protest, we have helped the country live up to its founding ideals. And not only for ourselves—black rights struggles paved the way for every other rights struggle, including women’s and gay rights, immigrant and disability rights.

Without the idealistic, strenuous and patriotic efforts of black Americans, our democracy today would most likely look very different—it might not be a democracy at all."

The scope of the project is astonishing. There are original literary works that help to illuminate the past from 16 writers including Eve Ewing, Clint Smith, Yusef Komunyakaa, Reginald Dwayne Betts, and Barry Jenkins. Through deft reporting and smart framing, contributing writers also make plain how the racist violence that informed slavery lives on today, in the way Americans live and die, teach and heal, lead, govern, eat, and even drive: How Segregation Caused Your Traffic Jam; How False Beliefs in Physical Racial Difference Still Live in Medicine Today; The Barbaric History of Sugar in America; Why American Prisons Owe Their Cruelty to Slavery, are just some of the headlines that await you.

If you have some time, I strongly recommend watching the video of the kick-off conference—even the first 20 minutes will be enough to set you right. It begins, as I now realize all things should, with poetry. But it also reveals the deep connection between the magazine’s staffers and contributors, at a poignant and celebratory moment. Think what you will about the media, this kind of project changes anyone who takes it on.

And this was a particularly particular group effort.

Two journalists were moved to tears during their remarks, tears that I understood to be an emotional acknowledgment of the enormous responsibility they took on by attempting to set a 400-year record straight; to connect dots that others have sought to erase, and to honor the legacies of elders some of whose names we may never know, in their own attempts to make the lies of America true.

They got the job done.

On Point
Congress to Wall Street: Do better The House Financial Services Committee released an analysis of the demographics and diversity policies of mega-banks yesterday—think Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Citigroup, and Wells Fargo— a follow up to hearings with their CEOs earlier this spring. The industry remains overwhelmingly white and male, and no major bank has a chief diversity officer that reports directly to the CEO. Click through for a rundown of the Committee’s recommendations, all of which will be familiar to you and celebrate this one: Close the pay gap between white men and underrepresented groups, pronto. (You can find a writeup of my interview with Michael Corbat, the CEO of Citi on this very topic here.) Fortune

The Trump Administration’s new immigration rule puts the ‘social safety net’ at risk “Conflating economic hardship with moral failure is an old tactic that has long been used to target immigrants,” writes Salonee Bhaman, a PhD candidate in history at Yale University. From the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1882 to the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, Trump’s rule really just builds on long-held racist perceptions of immigrants. But, as Bhaman points out, this limit creates a basis to question the use—or even potential use—of critical benefits and services, potentially discouraging people from seeking necessary support, and putting “human dignity on the line.” Surprised by this history? Read on to learn the ugly truth. Washington Post

The NFL turns to Jay Z’s Roc Nation to help ‘woke up’ its halftime show That’s one interpretation of this new partnership with Jay Z and his Roc Nation agency, who have been retained to co-produce (though not necessarily perform in) the Super Bowl halftime show. Expect content that supports the NFL’s “Inspire Change” community activism initiative, I suppose. But it also sounds like Jay Z is bringing a good dose of realism to the new relationship. “I think we have autonomy,” he said. “I anticipate that there will be a lot of—with any big organization, in this building right here [Roc Nation headquarters] we have internal problems. Anything that’s new is going to go through its growing pains. We put what we want to do on the table. The NFL agreed to it. So we’re going to proceed with that as if we have a partnership.” Colin Kaepernick was not available for comment. Washington Post

The stories in your family albums Thomas Allen Harris is an artist, filmmaker, and lecturer at Yale. And now, thanks to his new show on PBS, he’s about to become America’s most unlikely archivist. Family Pictures USA, which premiered on Monday, feels like a family reunion-themed mashup of The Moth and Antiques Roadshow, where people bring family photos to community events, and through conversation and investigation, find that they are connected to the history of the region and each other. The first episode, in Durham, N.C., reveals the history lurking in family photo albums of how 19th century tobacco money played out in the lives of black, white, and immigrant families, and even a drag community. Harris himself is a surprise and delight, identifying as “American, raised by a South African stepfather,” “same gender loving,” and “very invested in ideas of families of choice.” Click through for an extraordinary Q&A, including his surprising take on the true value of the family photo album. New York Times

On Background
Ads for runaway slaves offer an extraordinary glimpse into the complexity of history Former U.S. president Andrew Jackson has been invoked as a reasonable Southerner lately, a person who would have ended slavery if he’d lived long enough. While we may never know the answer (that’s a lie, we absolutely know), we do know that Jackson sounded pretty peeved when he placed an ad for a runaway slave in the Tennessee Gazette in October 1804. A “Mulatto Man Slave, about thirty years old, six feet and an inch high, stout made and active, talks sensible, stoops in his walk,” he wrote, noting that he “will pass for a free man… ” The reward was $50 plus expenses, with a cruel twist: “ten dollars extra, for every hundred lashes any person will give him, to the amount of three hundred.” This ad is one of thousands being preserved by the history department at Cornell University; the digitized collection are stunning windows into history. Jackson owned about 150 enslaved persons when he died in 1845. Washington Post

On being the great-granddaughter of an Igbo slave-trader This surprising and important piece from Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani, explores the slave trade from the Nigerian side of the equation. Some of this we already knew: Long before the Europeans took trafficking in human beings to scale, the Igbo people enslaved other Igbo people as punishment for crimes, indebtedness, or as spoils of war. But what is extraordinary to learn is the degree to which the amplification of demand impacted the community, and how the descendants of formerly enslaved Igbo people are still stigmatized to this day. For the Nigerian people who are lucky enough to know their own history, it can get complicated. “African intellectuals tend to blame the West for the slave trade, but I knew that white traders couldn’t have loaded their ships without help from Africans like my great-grandfather,” she writes. New Yorker

The Underground Railroad’s complex history After Colson Whitehead’s magnificent novel The Underground Railroad debuted, there was renewed interest in the history of the abolitionist network that helped slaves journey North to freedom. (We’re still waiting to spend our Tubmans, sadly.) Thankfully, historians were prepared to mind the knowledge gap and help point out where our collective memory is flawed. In fact, the stories we think we know about the Railroad, “like so many that we tell about our nation’s past, a tricky relationship to the truth: not quite wrong, but simplified; not quite a myth, but mythologized.” At the heart of the stories we do manage to tell? White heroes. New Yorker

Tamara El-Waylly helps write and produce raceAhead.

Quote

“ON BEING BROUGHT FROM AFRICA TO AMERICA
’Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land, / Taught my benighted soul to understand / That there’s a God, that there’s a Saviour too: / Once I redemption neither fought nor knew, / Some view our sable race with scornful eye, / ‘Their colour is a diabolic die.’ / Remember, Christians, Negroes, black as Cain, / May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train.”

—Phillis Wheatley, from the first book of poetry published by an African American, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, 1773. She was only seven or eight when she was kidnapped and taken to Boston in 1761.

'This Is America' Seals Glover's Rep As Protest Artist

Childish Gambino attends The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute benefit gala celebrating the opening of the Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination exhibition on Monday, May 7, 2018, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)

WASHINGTON (AP) — It's been called a moving testament to modern times and an unflinching exploration of the wretched past experienced by African-Americans. Donald Glover's "This Is America," a music video that depicts gun violence amid a mélange of racism, Negro minstrel shows, police brutality and mass killing, not only touched off a national debate, it affirmed Glover's place in the pantheon of artists who reveal uncomfortable truths about race through their work.

"The themes ain't new but this brings it into fresh (but dark) light," author and pop critic Luvvie Ajayi said Sunday in her online column. "It turned the mirror on this country and said 'see your life.' It is a read, an indictment and a challenge."

This terrain is not new for Glover either. Through his award-winning FX show "Atlanta," which has gotten critical acclaim for its portrayal of black Southern life, Glover has delved into topics ranging from single parenthood to crime, the pitfalls of fame and recently, youth suicide. As his musical alter-ego Childish Gambino, Glover performed "This Is America" last weekend while serving as guest host of "Saturday Night Live." He released the video around the same time.

Glover also has been outspoken about his career arc. As "Saturday Night Live" host, he joked about being turned down for the SNL cast in the past despite his many talents. After his "Deadpool" TV project was scrapped earlier this year, Glover took executives at FX and Marvel to task by releasing a fake Deadpool script in which the main character wonders whether racism was why the project was killed. He later deleted the tweets with his complaints, including the script.

Still, Glover's star is rising. He's set to appear in two upcoming Disney properties — the live-action Lion King remake and as Lando Calrissian in "Solo: A Star Wars Story." Lester Spence, co-director of the Center for Africana Studies at John Hopkins University, called Glover's "This Is America" an heir to "Strange Fruit," recorded by Billie Holiday in 1939 to protest lynchings of African-Americans in the South.

There have been others: Nina Simone's "Mississippi Goddam," N.W.A.'s "F--- Tha Police," Marvin Gaye's "Mercy, Mercy Me (The Ecology)," Public Enemy's "Fight the Power." But what sets "This is America" apart, Spence said, is that it "functions as an R&B song but also functions as a really, really powerful 'Black' with a capital 'B' commentary."

"I can't think of any other video that deals with American violence in the way that 'This Is America' does," Spence said. The video's imagery is jarring: Police chases, a black guitar player shot point-blank in the head then dragged away unceremoniously, a black choir being gunned down mid-song — both times with the weapon treated with kid gloves — all while a shirtless Gambino sings, dances and raps with a smile on his face.

He sings: "Yeah, this is America/ Guns in my area/ I got the strap/ I gotta carry 'em." At the video's end, he appears to be chased by a white mob. The reactions on social media were swift. "Donald Glover is a Genius," tweeted singer Erykah Badu, who explored poverty, violence and African-American identity in her 2008 album, "New Amerykah Part One."

Calvin C. Winbush II, who played the murdered guitar player in the video, told REVOLT TV in an interview Monday that he feels the video shows how desensitized America has become to violence against people of color.

"In a matter of seconds, (my character) being shot and taken away was shocking," Winbush said. "We can say that's rude to show that, but this happens for real. 'He shot up the choir? That's crazy.' This happens for real. This is America."

The general consensus was that "This Is America" was a condemnation of gun violence, which disproportionately affects African Americans. Gun violence is the top killer of African Americans aged 15 to 34, according to the NAACP, and blacks are nearly half of all gun homicide victims, while making up only 13 percent of the population.

"There is a direct commentary on the commonness of gun violence and the rush to protect the gun and not necessarily the rush to understand, to mourn, to really engage with the loss of life, particularly in the area of black life," Treva Lindsey, an Ohio State University women's study professor told the AP in an interview. "That is something that is significant here, his drilling down the gun violence conversation distinctly to the loss of black life."

Glover's use of violence, and the reactions to it from mainstream America, bothered some. Terron Moore, senior director of social media at MTV, said he considered it "traumatizing" to use images of fellow African Americans being killed as entertainment. Many of those who texted him to praise Glover's video as "'amazing' and 'groundbreaking,'" were white, he said.

"I really like the song, I don't hate the video, and I can respect the importance of art reflecting the world we live in," Moore said. "But that ... is REALLY happening without anyone putting it in a music video."

Jesse J. Holland covers race and ethnicity for The Associated Press. Contact him at jholland@ap.org, on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/jessejholland or on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/jessejholland . You can read his stories at AP at http://bit.ly/storiesbyjessejholland

Orans Black Museum

I was able to take a complete tour of one of the intellectual hubs of Black African art which is almost hidden in the Santa Barbara Plaza on Marlton Avenue in Mid-City, Los Angeles. Oranz Black Museum is a world of its own and one needs to take a thorough tour of this museum of black culture in order to give props for this great idea.

It has all you can think of in the world of art, ancient history, anthropology, millions of pictures and prints rarely seen elsewhere. I was amazed and what I saw was incredible. The library of rare books, the stones collected from the Pyramid sites in Egypt, the stage, the lightings, the magnificent gallery and collections of great Black American legends who changed our lives over time.

The picture above is a BaSuka Mask with origins from Massai's of Kenya and South African Zulus. I will be taking a second tour in the coming weeks and should be chatting one-on-one with OZ as he is known by his admirers. Stick around!