Heritage, History & Cultural Insights

What July 4 Feels Like When You Know Too Much

I don’t always know what to do with July 4. Not in the practical sense. Practically, it’s easy enough. If family’s cooking, Imma show up. If somebody has the grill...

“Ain’t No New Thing” and the Art of Recognizing...

Gil Scott-Heron’s “Ain’t No New Thing” was more than a poem about stolen music. It was a warning about cultural theft, American amnesia, and the art of recognizing the pattern.

James Baldwin Wrote Like Somebody Was Counting ...

Most of us meet James Baldwin after the sentence is already polished. We meet the quote. The interview clip. The cigarette smoke. The steady stare. The voice that sounds like...

Writing the Self: Maya Angelou and the Revoluti...

Maya Angelou lived many lives, and I love that about her. What moves me even more is that she seemed to understand those lives could be authored. Every chapter became...

Our Art Used to Be a Language: The Hidden Meani...

Relearning the Language of Bogolanfini and Preserving Black Cultural Identity Most of us in the diaspora were hand fed tiny fragments of our history and were never meant to notice...

Gil Scott-Heron: The Legacy of a Spoken Word Pi...

Discover the life and legacy of Gil Scott-Heron. Explore how his poetry and music shaped the Civil Rights movement and influenced the birth of modern hip-hop.