Heritage
African rhythms, ideas of sin and the Hammond organ: The evolution of gospel music
A choir sings traditional gospel music. Staff Sgt. Bernardo Fuller The enslaved Africans who first arrived in the British colony of Virginia in 1619 after being forcefully removed from their natural environments left much behind, but their rhythms associated with...
Mysterious missing parts of Malcolm X’s autobiography found
For decades, a burning question loomed over a towering 20th-century book: “The Autobiography of Malcolm X”: What happened to the reputedly missing chapters that may have contained some of the most explosive thoughts of the African-American firebrand assassinated in 1965?
Civil rights legend Meredith says he’s on a mission from God
Meredith aims to confront what he sees as society’s “breakdown of moral character” by encouraging people to live by the Ten Commandments.
Rosa Parks family house set for auction
The house where Rosa Parks sought refuge after fleeing the South amid death threats is scheduled for auction next week with a minimum bid of $1 million.
Tracing Mandela’s footsteps 100 years after his birth
Follow in Mandela’s footsteps from the villages where he was born and raised, to the Soweto township where he became an anti-apartheid leader, to Robben Island where he was imprisoned for years.
Feds Reopen Emmett Till Case
Last year, the 1955 case came to light again when Till’s accuser, Carolyn Bryant Donham, admitted that she lied in her testimony about the brutal beating and murder of the 14-year-old Chicago boy.
When gospel sermons came on the phonograph
The first truly African-American musical form, the “Spirituals,” took shape in the 17th and 18th centuries within the generations of slaves born into the tough American experience. Music was a daily part of their survival and sustenance. Spirituals were sung “a...
Hidden figures: How black women preachers spoke truth to power
Each semester I greet the students who file into my preaching class at Howard University with a standard talk. The talk is not an overview of the basics – techniques of sermon preparation or sermon delivery, as one might expect. Outlining the basics is not...
Powerful Stories Hidden in Abandoned Cemeteries
African-American cemeteries across the country have largely been neglected, their powerful histories obscured by weeds, debris and, as much as anything, the passage of time.
Frederick Douglass: ‘What Is July 4th to the Negro?’
The legendary abolitionist’s speech ‘The Meaning of July 4th for the Negro’ became his most famous statement on America’s struggle to live up to its own creed. What can we learn from it today?