Thursday, May 2

Tag: woman

What A White Woman Would Do
No Comments
IN OTHER NEWS

What A White Woman Would Do

It’s been 20 years since I started giving my friends the advice, “What would a white girl do?” It began as an urgent appeal to my sister, who, while we were in college, had gotten into a physical fight with her roommate. The girl bit my sister on her shoulder, leaving a gross purple bruise and a bite mark. It was early in the day, and my sister, accompanied by a friend, walked several blocks to my apartment. When I opened the door, my sister unraveled in tears. She was trying to pull herself together to get to class only to then, after class, go on to work. My sister worked as a waitress in a new trendy French cafe in what was becoming a gentrified Brooklyn: She knew she would be too much of an emotional mess for work. She was crying that she was sore, exhausted, and emotionally all over...
Read More
Biden Revives Plan To Put A Black Woman Of Faith On The $20 Bill
No Comments
Religion

Biden Revives Plan To Put A Black Woman Of Faith On The $20 Bill

The Biden administration has revived a plan to put Harriet Tubman on the US$20 bill after Donald Trump’s Treasury secretary delayed the move. That’s encouraging news to the millions of people who have expressed support for putting her face on the bill. But many still aren’t familiar with the story of Tubman’s life, which was chronicled in a 2019 film, “Harriet.” Harriet Tubman worked as a slave, spy and eventually an abolitionist. What I find most fascinating, as a historian of American slavery, is how her belief in God helped Tubman remain fearless, even when she came face to face with many challenges. Tubman’s early life Tubman was born Araminta Ross in 1822 on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. When interviewed later in life, Tubman said she started working as a housemaid when she was 5. ...
Read More
Why the US still hasn’t had a woman president
No Comments
Journalism, POLITICS

Why the US still hasn’t had a woman president

Estonia, Singapore, Ethiopia and Finland – these are some of the 21 countries currently governed by a female president or prime minister. Yet a woman president of the U.S. still remains only a hypothetical. The 2020 Democratic nomination contest originally featured six women candidates, a record number. But the most prominent female candidates for the Democratic nomination – Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar – have all dropped out, and the focus of the race has narrowed to two males. My research examines what countries where women run the government have in common – and why the U.S. still lags behind. Where women lead Since 2000, 89 women have newly come to power. That’s more than double the total number of women who entered office between 1960 and 1999. Women’s greater...
Read More
Mary McLeod Bethune The Most Famous Black Woman In The World
No Comments
IMPACT

Mary McLeod Bethune The Most Famous Black Woman In The World

Mary McLeod Bethune founded a college, defied the Klan, advised presidents, and like my grandmother, was a fierce warrior for justice. Born in 1914, Dovey Johnson Roundtree was subject to the double barriers of institutionalized racism and sexism, but rose from poverty to become a distinguished champion of civil and women’s rights. As a member of the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps during WWII, she helped desegregate the US military. She went on to become a crusading lawyer, winning a landmark bus desegregation case in 1955. As a minster in the 1960s, she was in the vanguard of women ordained as leaders in the AME church. In her memoir, Mighty Justice: My Life in Civil Rights, Roundtree describes how the support of community, mentors, and family nurtured her career. In this excerpt, Roundtre...
Read More
No Comments
Journalism

Fort Worth cop who shot black woman in her home to be questioned as concerns are raised about use of force

The white Fort Worth police officer accused of shooting a black woman inside her home over the weekend has resigned, Interim Police Chief Ed Kraus announced Monday. Atatiana Jefferson, 28, was gunned down early Saturday by an officer who'd been summoned to her Fort Worth home to conduct a welfare check by a neighbor who reported seeing Jefferson's front door open. Bodycam footage released by police showed two officers canvassing the property before one shouted, "put your hands up, show me your hands," and fired through a window. Kraus on Monday identified the officer involved in the shooting as Aaron Dean. He said Dean was placed on detached duty and stripped of his badge and firearm after he was served with his written administrative complaint yesterday. "My intent was to meet with him t...
Read More
No Comments
IN OTHER NEWS

Charges dropped against pregnant woman shot in stomach

Marshae Jones was arrested for manslaughter after her foetus died when she was shot during a fight with another woman. This photo provided by Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office shows Marshae Jones, the woman at the centre of the case [Handout/Jefferson County Sheriff''s Office/AP Photo] An Alabama prosecutor dismissed charges on Wednesday against a woman in the United States who was charged by state authorities over the death of her foetus, having miscarried after being shot five times. Marshae Jones, 27, was shot in the abdomen in December during a fight with another woman, resulting in the death of her five-month-old foetus. She was arrested last week for manslaughter, as authorities said she was responsible for the fight escalating. Her lawyer ...
Read More
No Comments
IN OTHER NEWS

Black transgender woman who was attacked in April fatally shot

Muhlaysia Booker found dead in Texas on Saturday, about a month after she was assaulted in an attack caught on video. Muhlaysia Booker is the fourth black transgender woman to be killed in the US this year, rights groups say [File: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post/Getty Images] A 23-year-old transgender woman seen on a widely circulated video being beaten in front of a crowd of people has been found dead in Dallas, Texas. Police say the body of Muhlaysia Booker, who was shot dead, was found in a street on Saturday and that no suspect has been identified. She was pronounced dead at the scene. Investigators say there's no apparent link to the April 12 beating Booker suffered after she was involved in a minor traffic accident. A mobile phone r...
Read More
As An African American Woman, I’m Your Most Unlikely Homesteader
No Comments
Journalism

As An African American Woman, I’m Your Most Unlikely Homesteader

Slavery forced a wedge between Black people and the land. But now the garden feels more like church—a place for my spirit to be renewed. On a crisp March 2015 day, in a D.C. suburb, my family and I stood in a fenced-in community garden, nestled behind a church, looking at a grassy, weeded over, 10-foot-by-20-foot rectangular plot, daring us to tame it. The overcast sky hung over us, and our shoes grew damp from the dewy grass. “What are we supposed to do with this?” This was not what I imagined when I signed up at my friend’s suggestion to join a community garden. I envisioned rich dark soil, in neatly arranged rows, waiting for us to sow vegetable seeds and water them with cute silver watering cans. But we dug in, and that day marked not just the beginning of my heal...
Read More
I Stopped Playing the “Strong Black Woman”
No Comments
SOCIAL JUSTICE

I Stopped Playing the “Strong Black Woman”

We are paying for this myth we’ve bought into with our lives.I never saw my grandmother rest. From morning to night, she appeared to be in service: cooking and cleaning, helping and caring for others. She died of a heart attack at 69. As I reflect today on the high rates of heart disease, stress, obesity, and other physical as well as mental ailments among African American women, I wonder what would have been the impact had she said, “I ain’t cooking tonight, everybody is on their own,” or “I’m headed out for a walk,” or simply, “I’m tired, and I need to rest.” What messages might I have inferred from watching her take 15 minutes of quiet time in the morning to “get centered.” Instead, I observed what appeared to be a never-ending pace of busyness, problem-solving, and making en...
Read More