James Baldwin Digs Into the Roots of American Music
James Baldwin’s writing about music illuminates the significance of racial slavery for all American music. Black American music can help America to move forward if used properly.
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1980s Pop Music and the Atomic Pleasure Dome
Saturated in apocalyptic fears of the atomic bomb, 1980s music was also danceable and transporting. How can something that was so horrible also be so much fun?
The Unmentionable Whiteness of ‘Americanaland’
John Milward’s new history of Americana puts the mixed genre at the corner of country and rock while slighting race and the music’s Black roots and performers.
Runway Punk: A Story of Celebration and Co-option
Haute couture designers tap into the socio-political commentary of punk’s confrontational attire to reflect upon societal decay–and to satirize high fashion.
What Queen Anne Boleyn Can Teach Us About Duchess Meghan Markle
There are distinct similarities between the ways we perceive the historical figure of Anne Boleyn and the contemporary figure of Meghan Markle, and that’s a shame.
Photo Essay: Postcards from the COVID-19 Pandemic
Postcards from the milieu of the pandemic shutdown. A photo essay.
Smoking Saved My Life: A Skinny Jewish Kid Comes of Age in the Haze of American Violence
As cool as Marlon Brando, James Dean, Jack Kerouac or Dalton Trumbo, rebel Max "Flaco" Greenbaum grows up in Watts Riots-Vietnam-draft-era L.A. Too smart (and smart-mouthed) for school, the violence of this world is drawn in deep and lingers like the long, slow, life-saving drag of a cigarette.
The Underestimated Resilience of Peace and Modern Society
While we feast on fictionalized (and real) tales of murder and awfulness, we really just want to live our lives in peace and are not interested in preying upon one another. Our essential goodness has become clear during our times of COVID-19.
Amanda Gorman’s History Lesson: An Inaugural Poem in the Shadow of White Supremacy
From the onset, Amanda Gorman's poem, "The Hill We Climb", dissolves the ideology that a presidential inauguration announces the new and deracinates the present from the past.
The Artless Losers: Trump and Monty Python’s Black Knight
Are we meant to admire those who, like the Black Knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, just won't concede defeat?
Why Racially Diverse British Period Dramas Matter
To this day, the history of people of color in England is often erased from dominant cultural narratives. Fictions, however, can collectively shift cultural narratives; we need stories to counter stories.
The Passion of Diego Armando Maradona
In that fine tradition of Latin American culture, Diego Armando Maradona was nothing if not a magical realist. Unconcerned with good and evil, he embodied that ancient connection between children and godliness.