The Root

If you’ve grown weary of wearing your raspberry beret and are looking for some new sounds to blast in the speakers of your little red corvette, then allow me to introduce you to Prince’s Welcome 2 America!

Covid rates have continued to rise throughout the country at honestly the worst time. What should’ve been a fall that marked a true return to pre-pandemic life, has instead been derailed because suddenly everyone thinks they’re an expert in vaccines, despite likely getting a C at best in high school chem-phys. In an…Read more...

“Black women continue to be the blueprint,” tweeted designer Fisayo Longe on Thursday, after seeing some designs eerily familiar to her own in Fendi’s Resort 2022 lookbook. How else can you explain the fact since the U.K.-based Kai Collective launched its signature, ‘60s-inspired “Gaia” print last year, not one, but …Read more...

Yooooooo, what TF is in the water in Mount Laurel, N.J. that has racist white people wilding out on camera like they were spring breakers in, well, New Jersey, probably? It hasn’t even been a full month since Edward Mathews, who I affectionately refer to as New Jersey’s Phony Soprano, was caught in viral video…Read more...

It seems the difficult divorce between Dr. Dre and ex-wife Nicole Young has finally reached some sort of resolution.Read more...

If I’ve learned anything in adulthood, it’s that people can say all the right things, but it doesn’t mean a damn thing if they aren’t backing it up. Take, for instance, all the companies that spoke out against the restrictive voting laws passed by Georgia earlier this year. While multiple law firms and companies like…Read more...

Jordan Peele has gotten out (heh) of whatever creative content vault he was hiding in and has something new to promote.Read more...

Is it just me, or do conservative affirmations always seem to come with some kind of caveat?Read more...

Tell the truth: after over a year spent primarily in lockdown, how many of you were really ready for “Hot Girl Summer” this year? Oh, I know, I know—for many of us, it started off well enough; some us even shed weight during all the time spent indoors (raises hand)—and promptly packed some of it back on again, as the…Read more...

Over the last year, there has been a concerted push for police reform in cities across the country. After two years of debate, Chicago has passed a civilian oversight board to hopefully hold police accountable for misconduct.

To read Akwaeke Emezi is to be constantly reminded that we are all more than flesh and bone. To be in conversation with the bestselling author is to understand what it is to be spirit simply shrouded in flesh—or, as Emezi refers to themselves, drawing on the Igbo spirituality of their native Nigeria, as “ogbanje”.Read more...

Memory is a funny thing. For instance, according to my memory I watched The Arsenio Hall Show regularly and had riveting conversations with my friends about the cultural significance of you-know-who-said-you-know-what-to-you-know-who-about-whatever-it-was-that-had-happened on the show the night before. The truth is,…Read more...

I’m pretty sure if you looked up the phrase “booked and busy” in the dictionary, you’d see a picture of Barack and Michelle Obama.Read more...

I am projecting the Black-ass bat signal into the sky with the following news: Batgirl is Afro-Latina.Read more...

Michaela Coel has been getting her things lately—and deservedly so.Read more...

Like the popular subreddit “Explain Like I’m Five Years Old,” (ELI5), The Root’s “Explain Like I’m a Racist 5-Year-Old” series dissects complex subjects into language simple enough to be understood by a racist baby.Read more...

Long before I knew I was magic I wanted to be an “Around the Way Girl.” At the height of his career, LL Cool J released a song he wrote specifically for Black girls in the hood. The video for the song opens up with a frustrated LL rejecting the premise of what he called a “stuck up girl” and lyrically painting the…Read more...

A Black man in South Carolina is suing the city of Rock Hill, its police department and U.S. Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) for defamation after charges against him were dropped in an incident where he was attacked by a police officer for no reason.

The chief corrections counsel for Alaska’s attorney general is now the subject of an investigation by the state’s department of law after researchers found he allegedly operated a secret right-wing Twitter account that he used to spread anti-Jewish propaganda, denounce the Black Lives Matter movement, whine about…Read more...

A 17-year-old girl is making history by becoming the first Black swimmer to represent Zimbabwe in the Olympics. If you’re amazed that it took until 2021 for that to happen, trust me, you’re not alone.Read more...

The Kennedy Center Honors will be welcoming a new class of honorees into the fold soon and one of the additions is sure to have you “dancing in the street.”Read more...

Michael “Air” Jordan may have gotten his nickname because of his leaping ability on the basketball court, but he’s also still up there in the air casting a shadow over LeBron James...metaphorically speaking, of course.Read more...

A member of the white supremacist group Patriot Front was arrested in Haverhill, Ma., Monday and charged with multiple hate crimes related to property damage, harassment, armed threats and distribution of white nationalist propaganda. Among other crimes, he’s accused of helping to decorate the city with white…Read more...

“[There’s] a point where you get frustrated, where you give your body, mind, and time to an industry and you feel like, ‘Can you now support us, we’ve been the pioneers of your creativity, of your artistry, and of your inspiration so give us the platform and the voice that we need in order to continue,” supermodel…Read more...

When you think of the word “superstar,” what person comes to mind?

Like Hannah Nikole-Jones before her, NBA Countdown and NBA Finals host Maria Taylor will not be where she is not wanted.

Throughout the pandemic, there has been much debate surrounding face masks, social distancing, vaccines, and the various measures used to combat the spread of the virus. So much so, that at times it feels the human cost of the pandemic is forgotten about. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) brought…Read more...

Viola Davis has a story to tell—and no, it’s not How to Get Away With Murder. On Wednesday, it was announced that Davis will be releasing a memoir titled Finding Me in April of next year.Read more...

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s big moment as a superhero is getting closer...well, kind of. We have a bit of a longer wait until we finally see it, but he’s talking about it while promoting his upcoming movie Jungle Cruise.Read more...

First, Logan Paul took on Floyd Mayweather and then, Logan’s father, Rand, was looking for a dust up with America’s most beloved immunologist, Dr. Anthony Fauci.

Sooner or later, white people are going to have to learn there is no context in which their use of the n-word is anything less than inappropriate and racist. It doesn’t matter what form of the word they use, if they used it while telling a story in which it was used or if they were repeating what they heard some Black…Read more...

One of my favorite parts of Blackness is the very specific shared knowledge-set that so many of us have about very specific people, places and things. There is an entire universe that exists within Blackness—The Black Mainstream—where people like Kirk Franklin are household names and Clifton Powell might as well be a…Read more...

Sometimes, you should just sit there and enjoy your show. That’s the main takeaway from the Twitter melée that ensued on Tuesday afternoon after Tony-nominated playwright and screenwriter Jeremy O. Harris (Slave Play; Zola) spontaneously tweeted his admiration for the writing of the always controversial creator of …Read more...

I will admit that I was wrong.

The first episode of Tiger Woods’ miniseries is out now.Read more...

(This is part one of a two-part series where writer Christina Blacken takes the Ford Bronco Sport to Chicago’s surrounding wilderness).Read more...

Hump Day has a specific meaning this week because we have to get over the hump to finally make it to Thursday—which will likely focus a lot on Kanye West. I’m already tired!

I gathered my things as quickly as I could. I left school in a rush and ran to my bus.

Forget having a moment, Normani is the moment.

White people prove time and time again they are far too fragile and wrapped up in privilege and denial to even consider the possibility that race played a part in the way a thing unfolded.Read more...

Elevated and luxury streetwear brands are on the come-up and Virgil Abloh is king. From establishing his luxury streetwear brand Off-White, to being named artistic director of Louis Vuitton’s men’s wear, Abloh has been bringing the concept of elevated streetwear to life for almost fifteen years.Read more...

Don’t you hate when you’re just trying to promote your podcast and cigar brand and then get caught up in a failed insurrection? That’s supposedly what happened to an agent of the Drug Enforcement Agency who was arrested for trespassing on Capitol grounds during the Capitol riot.

What does the world looks like for our trailblazers of tomorrow? To find out, OshKosh B’gosh believes we can all benefit from taking a look back at where some of our icons began. On Tuesday, an inspiring new back-to-school campaign, Today is Someday, was unveiled by the much-beloved babies and children’s apparel…Read more...

I don’t think it comes as a surprise to anyone that the 2021 Olympic games feels like a bit of a shitshow. We’re still in the midst of a global pandemic, with the more contagious Delta variant of the COVID-19 virus quickly becoming the dominant strain stateside. As more and more Olympic participants contract the…Read more...

If you don’t know their names, you either know their iconic look and style...or their iconic songs. Whether it’s Janet Jackson, Michael Jackson, New Edition, Sounds of Blackness, Yolanda Adams, Usher, Mary J. Blige, Mariah Carey, Barry White, Boyz II Men, Karyn White and beyond, you can thank this legendary…Read more...

Last week, The Root reported that the Texas state Senate voted 18-4 to pass Senate Bill 3—another white fragility bill masquerading as anti-Critical Race Theory legislation. The GOP in Texas—which is fast becoming the sanctuary state where terrible and oppressive laws go to thrive—wants to ditch requirements for…Read more...

We may know him U-S-H-E-R-R-A-Y-M-O-N-D, but to Usher’s three—soon to be four—kids, he’s just Dad.Read more...

It only took more than 600,000 deaths in the United States from COVID-19 for some Fox News hosts to finally take the virus seriously.

Before the Capitol riot even took place, groups like the Proud Boys were already making it known they were prepared to act a fool on Jan. 6. The leader of the group pleaded guilty to burning a Black Lives Matter banner during a violent demonstration in Washington D.C., last December.Read more...

There are nuances and challenges to navigate in every marriage—and certainly in every pregnancy. But as actor Joshua Jackson (The Affair, Little Fires Everywhere) recently shared with Esquire, his marriage to fellow actor Jodie Turner-Smith (Queen & Slim, Tom Clancy’s Without Remorse) has been one punctuated by not…Read more...