Saartjiemania, Serena and The Politics of Black Humiliation by Otamere Guobadia It is nearly impossible to deny that we live in a gladiatorial zeitgeist. A world in which Jerry Springer and Jeremy Kyle’s shows mine working class sorrow for the satiation of eager and complicit audiences. A culture of humiliation. Humiliation of the disenfranchised plays… Read More
The Unbearable White Ignorance of Annie Lennox
by Zoé Samudzi After her October interview with Tavis Smiley, I no longer think of Annie Lennox solely as the edgy, cool, and philanthropic Eurythmics frontwoman. I now see her as an embodiment of white ignorance. On her new album Nostalgia, Lennox covers “Strange Fruit,” a song popularised by Billie Holiday in 1939 that describes,… Read More
Young Voices: The policing and repackaging of black music go hand in hand
by Amika Shah It’s not often that grime legend Wiley’s Twitter account is seen as a place for reasoned debate. However, over the weekend, the BBC’s urban radio station, BBC Radio 1Xtra released what it calls its ‘Power List’ – a list of the most influential artists in British black music, which seemed to be… Read More
Emojis as White Supremacy? :-/
by Yomi Adegoke It’s very rare I find myself on the same proverbial page as Miley Cyrus. But in 2012 when she remarked on the peculiar omission of black faces from the emoji keyboard, I very much wanted to administer to her that fist bump on the behalf of the black community she has spent this… Read More
Why Make a Caricature of what are Complex Feelings for Some Black Women?
by Leona Nichole Black A video has been circulating my Facebook news feed this week. It stages a scene in which a Black man brings his white girlfriend into a barber shop. A hairdresser who is a hired actress says a number of inappropriate things about the couple and the presence of this woman. The… Read More
What’s the problem with Black Masculinities?
by Dr Ornette D Clennon Like so many of us, I was spellbound by the recent conversation between bell hooks and Melissa Harris Perry that showed beyond any doubt the lively power of an intersectional analysis that concerns itself with the entanglements of race, gender, class and sexuality in history and in everyday life. One… Read More
Iggy Azalea and a Culture of Appropriation
TRIGGER WARNING: The following post contains incidents of racism and homophobia: by Shane Thomas It’s best to begin this with a statement of intent: I ingest a lot of popular culture. It’s the staple of a lot of conversations with friends, a reliable icebreaker when meeting new people and can make me a useful addition… Read More
Is the sexuality of black women judged differently from that of white women?
Is the sexuality of black women judged differently from that of white women? “the image of white women as the standard of beauty and respectability is dominant throughout Brazilian society. Without making reference to the countless studies that analyze the question of race and representation in Brazilian society and media (and there are hundreds of… Read More
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