The most important thing to know about the late Representative Shirley Chisholm (D-NY) is not that she was a Black woman who made a serious bid to become the Democratic party nominee for President in 1972. The most important thing to know about Shirley Chisholm is that she was a Black woman who made a… Read more →
Tag: Race
The Complicated Legacy of Carol Moseley Braun
Thus far in the Run Like A Girl series, we’ve met pathbreaking women who — with the notable exception of Lenora Fulani — have long since passed on. Today, we turn to recent history, to a former presidential candidate who is very much alive, if no longer politically active: Carol Moseley Braun. Carol Moseley Braun made… Read more →
Fears of a White Mother for her Biracial Son
My son could be Philandro Castile, the Minnesota cafeteria manager who was shot by police in July 2016 as he simply reached for his license during a traffic stop. I am a white woman in the South, raising a black son. I have grown used to the stares of surprise and barely-hidden shock. This is… Read more →
“We’ve Got to Get to Work”: John Lewis’s March
Congressman John Lewis is an American hero. As he tweeted on the anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington, he is the only speaker from that day of legendary oratory still alive. In his twenties, Lewis was the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and the youngest member of the “Big Six” leaders… Read more →
Lenora Fulani: She “Fuled” the Bern
Universal healthcare. Free university education. The regulation of the big banks. No my friends, I’m not talking about Bernie Sanders in 2016. I’m referring to Dr. Lenora Fulani (b. 1950), the most successful female minor party candidate in US history. As a member of the New Alliance Party in the 1980s and 1990s — a… Read more →
“Made in America”: O.J. Simpson, Race, and the Triumph of Toxic Masculinity
Black and white America could not have been further apart than on the morning of October 3, 1995 when a jury acquitted O.J. Simpson in the murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. While most white Americans responded to the jury’s “not guilty” verdict with horror, many African-Americans rejoiced. Filmmaker Ezra Edelman seeks to… Read more →
Teaching in an Era of Black Lives Matter
One of the functions of social movements is to raise consciousness around a particular problem or issue. The Black Lives Matter movement is no different. Activists have successfully used disruptive protest, policymaking, and social media to influence public debates around structural racism, state violence, policing, and mass incarceration. The movement, as well as my experiences… Read more →
Venus Revisited
“Creepy.” “Weird.” “Messed. Up.” Such are the visceral responses of my women’s history students to an admittedly bizarre and complex historical phenomenon: the Anatomical Venus. Designed to be realistic and anatomically correct wax models of the female body, Anatomical Venuses emerged in eighteenth-century Europe (primarily Spain, Italy, and Austria) to help train medical students who… Read more →
“Ain’t No Bitches Gonna Hunt No Ghosts”
2016 is Terrible, So Go Watch Ghostbusters, Laugh, and Let Feminism Save Us All Dear Ghostbuster boys. Sit down and close your mouths. Stop talking. Stop leaving your stupid Rotten Tomatoes reviews, and your comment threads, and doing your misogynist, racist, sexist tweeting and mansplaining. Just. Stop. First, you drove Leslie Jones off Twitter with… Read more →
“Why does Congress wish to have mothers and babies die?”
It takes a rare political personality to gain regular air-time on today’s political pundit shows. Former Ohio State Senator Nina Turner is one of those personalities. If anyone is going to grab precious minutes on air it’s Turner, a politician who wore a T-shirt emblazoned with the words “GOP — Get Out of My Panties”… Read more →