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Black in the Middle: An Anthology of the Black Midwest (excerpt)

In this excerpt of Black in the Middle, PopMatters' Mark Reynolds compares the nearly identical racial divides in his cities, Cleveland and Chicago, that to this day are stubbornly entrenched.

                                      
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In this excerpt of Black in the Middle, PopMatters' Mark Reynolds compares the nearly identical racial divides in his cities, Cleveland and Chicago, that to this day are stubbornly entrenched.

Although Andre Perry's essays in his debut, Some of Us Are Very Hungry Now, traverse various geographical journeys, they are, overall, ballads, images from the self, the man isolated and marginalized in other countries and in his own land.

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Noted historian David W. Blight offers readers the fullest portrait of Frederick Douglass yet in this "biography of a voice".

The Asian legacy of Doctor Strange is more complex than you know.

Papi Chulo's heart is in the right place. The problem is, from the Latino perspective, the "friendship" in this story could be the basis of a horror movie.

Among other critiques of identity politics, Haider believes that we each can slip between identities at will. Indeed, it's a universal human condition.

The humor in this film goes hand-in-paw with the blunt, vulgar symbolism of a dog's lifted leg in the opening credits.

How the allure of newness is leading Kanye West astray.

Instead of cherry-picking facts and quotes, Joseph Vogel lets Prince's legacy shine in all its vague and erratic splendor.

With the recent release of Bad Stories: What the Hell Just Happened to Our Country, Steve Almond talks in-depth about the US president whom most parents wouldn't even let on the playground -- and about his beef with the American left.

Black Panther is more than just another Marvel blockbuster; it's a revelation in Western depictions of Africa and African women.

In light of movements like Black Lives Matter and Me Too, Dave Chappelle's 2000 film, Killin' Them Softly may be even more relevant today. But how's his humor holding up?

First-time directors Boots Riley and Carlos López Estrada tackle racial identity in radically different ways.

Reading the struggle of Patterson and her comrades a century ago reminds us that today's racist violence is not a temporary aberration but a deeply rooted and pervasive flaw in American society.

There's a reason why Ta-Nehesi Coates is often compared to James Baldwin, and there's a reason why Baldwin's work is so relevant in the age of Black Lives Matter.

If you can't make it to the Bata Shoe Museum, then pick up this oddly thrilling explanation of things we already suspect about footwear.

Julie Lythcott-Haims gives a voice to the internal dialogue—the self-loathing, really—of living a life as a biracial woman who, for most of her life, wasn't quite sure if she was allowed to call herself black.

Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and rock pioneer Lloyd Price’s life has been much more interesting than yours or mine, from writing hits with Fats Domino to playing an influential role in the Rumble in the Jungle. Yet Price still has many more yarns to spin even now.

Blackstar addresses the tension between David Bowie’s avowed attraction to ideologies of blood and soil, and his equally committed obsession with African American musical forms and tropes.

In contrast to our ossified conceptions of race in other aspects of life, race in professional wrestling is a gimmick, a performance of an identity, which one can adopt or drop as part of the game.

Strangers in a strange land has been the universal theme of the Jewish story. Roger Cohen's 'A Girl from Human Street' provides an emotional account of his family's diasporic journey.

How did Ray Charles become a key face and voice for country music in the '60s?

Hilton Als’ gift is his reinvention of famous figures, but from the angle of how well they succeeded or failed to confront white supremacy and privilege, or in their (in)abilities to give blacks a voice.

The worst thing about Connor as a character seems to me to have less to do with him possibly serving as an ethnic stereotype and more to do with the fact that he often just doesn't seem human at all.

Amongst themselves, the main cast of characters are nominal equals, and that contributes to a particular kind of status parsing.

The toilet, and its spirit ally, potty humor, has come to be associated with a kind of strength—both at the box office and in terms of a cultural defiance.

With the film adaptation of On the Road just a month away, it's important to once again define what characterized the Beat movement: an infatuation with the foreign.

In 1957, Academy Award-nominated actress Dorothy Dandridge found herself at the center of a smear campaign that betrayed the patriarchal and racial politics of Hollywood and the US at large. The '50s were far from calm.

From New York magazine to Punk Planet, Audrea Lim shows us how recent Asian American writing sensations Wesley Yang and Amy Chua get it wrong in their interpretations of what it means to be of Asian descent in American at the dawn of the 21st century.

In BioShock 2 and Minerva’s Den, Grace Holloway and Charles Porter’s racial identities link them to specific historical and cultural subjects without turning them into stereotypes or purely symbolic characters.

It's an American pop music creation myth: that blues and folk music developed along two distinct tracks, with their own distinct traditions, divided along racial lines. The truth is, of course, far more slippery and complicated.

Nothing like spending New Year's Eve with couple of white guys pretending to be black guys during a war-time year worthy of blowing its own brains out.

If you want to understand race and sexuality in the United States, don't bother with policy -- look at entertainment!

Pop Heroism, One Song at a Time

Ice Station serves as a very rewarding point of intersection, creating a central crossing for three roads which have seen, and continue to welcome, adventuresome sojourn.