The Root

Claudine Gay is curtains as the first Black woman president of Harvard University.Read more...

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Family reunions should be a lot more interesting this summer as the new year brings new revelations about celebrity relatives. We all know R&B star Ciara has some major NFL muscle in her family with husband, quarterback Russell Wilson. But on a recent episode of the hit PBS genealogy series, Finding Your Roots, she...Read more...

Our King of Pop, Michael Jackson is gone-but reportedly his 93-year-old mother Katherine Jackson is still very protective over how his estate makes money off his legacy and licensing his name. According to court documents obtained by Radar Online, the Jackson matriarch of the legendary family is asking Michael's...Read more...

Some of our posts include links to retailers. If you buy something from clicking on one, G/O Media may earn a commission. Because editorial staff is independent of commerce, affiliate linking does not influence our editorial content.Updated 01/3/2024 at 10:02 a.m. ET:

There are only so many Oscar nomination slots to go around, which means that every year there will be some noteworthy contenders who will get shut out. The reasons for this vary widely, and aren't always the same from year to year. Some films aren't high-profile enough. Some might be too controversial, or too risque....Read more...

What happened to vengeance being the Lord's?! A North Carolina pastor took matters into his own hands after allegedly pushing a fast-food employee's face into a deep fryer.

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When it comes to medical myths, Philly-based family physician Dr. Jen Caudle is known online for shedding light on popular misconceptions. The more than 224,000 subscribers to her YouTube channel and 162,000-plus followers on TikTok turn to Caudle to break down everything from the potential dangers of sea moss to what...Read more...

There's one unassailable truism when it comes to Black social media: We will leverage X, TikTok, Facebook and the like to ride for those of us we love or whom we feel were genuinely wronged - just look at how we got the entire planet on our page in an unprecedented response to George Floyd's murder.Read more...

The year 2023 didn't turn out great for everybody, especially for one Joe Abodeely-who had his life's work closed down due to his own stupid, hateful and discriminatory words.Read more...

Damn, that was quick. After Harvard University hired their first Black president, Claudine Gay, she didn't spend more than a few months in the position before handing in her resignation letter.

Chaka Khan spills all of the tea about her life and career in her newest interview with Rolling Stone. She addresses speculation about her retirement from music, learning about Prince's addiction, beef with Kanye West, and more. Here are all of your burning questions being answered!Read more...

At this point, Dave Chappelle making anti-trans comments in his latest Netflix stand up special isn't breaking news. His commitment to attacking an already marginalized community is basically his brand now. In The Dreamer," which premiered on Netflix on Sunday, the comedian continued his streak of mocking the trans...Read more...

A Sacramento County family had to start the New Year grieving the death of a 10-year-old boy who was fatally shot. What makes this story even more tragic is that the shooter was the same age as the victim.

It's not everyday that Grammy award-winning singer Toni Braxton trends on social media, but unfortunately for her this time around-it's not for anything good. I'll explain.Read more...

Harvard University President Claudine Gay has resigned from her position - making her tenure the shortest ever in the University's centuries-old existence.Read more...

Whether secular music with questionable" lyrics should be played during church is a divisive issue that the The dReam Center Church of Atlanta has found itself in the middle of this past weekend.Read more...

Keith Lee and his family did a lot of eating and got a lot of people talking on their five-month family food tour in 2023. So, for one of his last posts of the year, the popular food critic, who has over 15 million followers on TikTok and nearly 2 million followers on Instagram, dropped a video ranking the eight...Read more...

Taraji P. Henson recently went viral for her emotional, honest comments about the toll that being constantly disrespected as a Black actress has taken on her. As she broke down in tears, the Empire" star revealed the many costs that come with being a high-profile actress and how the unequal salaries of Black...Read more...

Updated as of 1/2/2024 at 9:30 a.m. ET

It looks like Opal Lee is finally getting the justice her family deserves...too bad it only took 80 years to happen. The 97-year-old woman, also known to many as the Grandmother of Juneteenth," was gifted land owned by her family before a racist mob destroyed their home and forced them to leave.Read more...

Howard University officials awoke to a concerning post on TikTok earlier this week. A video on the popular social media app showed a group breaking into Benjamin E. Mays Hall, which used to house the Howard University School of Divinity.Read more...

Rapper Megan Thee Hot Girl Stallion has added a new name to her title for 2024: Planet Fitness' Mother Fitness. With a new fashion collab and marketing campaign for the gym chain, Stallion is looking to help gymgoers tap into their Big Fitness Energy" this January.

For many people, it doesn't matter who you are, or what you've accomplished, all they see is skin color. And that was exactly the case for senior NBA reporter Marc J. Spears, who recently found himself being racially profiled during a recent shopping trip out in Healdsburg, California.Read more...

Now that it has been a few weeks since Black Hollywood exploded, we've had time to breathe and to stop jumping to conclusions. A previous opinion piece in The Root suggested that Keyes allowed the public to throw several innocent men under the bus by not revealing his abuser.Read more...

The Color Purple has been declared the second-biggest Christmas Day film release of all time. Along with dynamic acting and singing, there are also fantastic dance sequences. Fatima Robinson, a widely respected choreographer for some of the biggest artists in our lifetime, told Entertainment Weekly that she knew she...Read more...

Black people-everyone from athletes, actors and politicians to Real Housewives," talk show hosts and musicians-have made some big strides forward this year. Black characters have been fan-favorites in prestige TV, and the new The Color Purple" musical has sparked conversations about Black fashion, types of love and p...Read more...

A Karen is identified as an obnoxious, angry, entitled person who more than likely presents as a racist middle-aged white woman. However, these people don't only exist throwing tantrums in your local neighborhood.

After weeks of holiday cheer-and what feels like endless plays of Mariah Carey's All I Want For Christmas Is You"-the world has entered that gray period between wrapping up the old year and beginning the new. But no one seems to want the year to be over more than Black retail and service workers.Read more...

Tasha K and DJ Akademiks - two trash-talking Black gossip influencers" - are having the terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad week that they both deserve.Read more...

It's been a pretty memorable year in politics. But let's be honest...it's been mostly for bad reasons. But there were also many hilarious and wacky moments, so without further ado, here are the ones we couldn't stop laughing about on social media. - Jessica Washington Read MoreRead more...

As 2023 wraps up, it's safe to say that it was full of unpredictable moments. From that notorious Montgomery boat brawl to Keith Lee vs. Atlanta, here are the most viral moments from the last year.Read more...

The Barack and Michelle Obama-produced Netflix film, Leave The World Behind," is an apocalyptic thriller replete with Black History easter eggs, Julia Roberts awkwardly dancing, and metaphors used to underscore and warn of society's overdependence on technology, the rise of artificial intelligence, the destruction...Read more...

Being a grandpa is a good look for Al Roker. The TODAY Show weatherman is taking a little break from delivering the national forecasts to spend the holidays with his family. And judging by the smile on his face in his photos, he's having the time of his life. - Angela Johnson Read MoreRead more...

Coming up in the Black and largely Protestant City of Detroit, it felt like a revolutionary act to abandon the church and organized religion as I did as a teenager in the mid-1990s. But I had little recourse: As soon as I developed some adult-adjacent sense, I looked around and realized that the milk was sour...Read more...

Within days of Christmas, families in Iowa and Nebraska received some troubling news. Republican Governors in those states have announced that they're opting out of a summer Federal food assistance program. The program provides thousands of low-income families with an additional $40 per month in food assistance to...Read more...

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This year, we talked to some of the most influential Black entrepreneurs in the game for our exclusive business series, Securing the Bag. And while they shared way too much good advice to list here, we thought we'd end the year by looking back at some of the nuggets of wisdom they dropped that can help you no matter...Read more...

Dave Chappelle's latest Netflix stand-up special will premiere on New Year's Eve entitled The Dreamer. Earlier this month, a trailer was released that showed Chappelle's iconic C" logo with Morgan Freeman's voice stating: He's back, folks."Read more...

With sports in full swing, it got us thinking about Black athletes who have interesting (and weird) superstitions that have helped carry them to greatness. Some of them may disgust you, others may surprise you. But either way, it seems to have worked out for most of them.

An Indiana family is hoping to get citizenship for their adopted child with special needs before it's too late. Rebekah Hubley and her husband adopted Jonas, a nonverbal, blind, autistic child who has cerebral palsy and a seizure disorder, from Haiti in 2010, according to WSFA 12 Alabama. Since then, they have raised...Read more...

Amid all the festive fun of the holidays you may have missed the last few blockbusters of 2023. Luckily, some of them didn't have long theatrical releases, so now you can enjoy them at home. If jam-packed parties aren't your thing, ring in the new year by checking out some of 2023's biggest movies at home.Read more...

A good sense of style will always be respected, no matter what industry you're in. Some may think that for you to be successful in a certain industry you have to put your all into that craft and nothing else.Read more...

No matter how hard the studio tries, sometimes a film just doesn't cut the mustard. Whether it's an unnecessary sequel, a rom-com lacking any romance or comedy or a scary movie with no thrills, we suffered through quite a few duds this year. With the exception of one shockingly bad release, we're strictly going after...Read more...

In the wake of Jonathan Majors' guilty verdict in the assault of his ex-girlfriend, he was fired by Marvel Studios. While fans have been speculating on his future with the franchise since his arrest in March, the confirmation of his exit from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, led to new questions about his character,...Read more...

When the current T.D. Jakes triple-decker sandwich of controversy started last week, the super-sleuths and schadenfreude faithful combed the internet to find the good Bishop doing or saying anything to suggest that his sexual proclivities might deem him a hypocrite as a Christian mega pastor.Read more...

We can't imagine anything creepier than a collection of hundreds of brains encased behind museum walls. But as it turns out, the story of how they got there is even sketchier.Read more...

Before there was a 1985 movie, a musical, or a 2023 movie reboot, there was Alice Walker's 1982 book, The Color Purple." Required reading in many English classes, Walker's novel is a powerful story about resilience and the bonds of sisterhood.Read more...

The year of 2023 had a whole bunch of WTF-jaw-dropping-are you serious? moments. Some days, you had to take a pause after reading a headline because of the information you were about to receive.