The fear was that Klansmen would come to replicate the violence that had just racked Charlottesville. Originally published in The Nation. LAST FRIDAY MORNING, A REPORT spread through my hometown of Durham, North Carolina, that white supremacists were descending on downtown. “We are carefully monitoring the situation,” said an all-points bulletin to city workers, “and are taking precautions […]
Toppled! Ridding Durham of Its Racist Monument
The liberal city wanted it down; the GOP state legislature forbade that; activists found a way to end that impasse. Originally published in The American Prospect. JILLIAN JOHNSON WAS OUT of town Monday night, as a group of young activists were yanking the Confederate soldier statue off its granite pedestal in downtown Durham, North Carolina. She learned […]
Reclaiming Native Ground
Can Louisiana’s tribes restore their traditional diets as waters rise? Originally published by The Lens and the Food & Environment Reporting Network. Click here for the companion episode of the Southern Foodway Alliance’s Gravy podcast. WHEN THERESA DARDAR WAS GROWING UP in Houma, her mother used to take her to visit relatives in the Pointe-au-Chien Indian […]
Counterprotests Swamp KKK Celebration
A Ku Klux Klan gathering both recalled North Carolina’s racially troubled history and demonstrated the strength and diversity of the state’s civil rights movement today. Originally published in The American Prospect. IN THE END, SATURDAY’S “Victory Klavalkade”—a celebration of Donald Trump’s presidency by the North Carolina-based Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan—turned out […]
Democrats Make Gains in North Carolina Against Backdrop of Voter Suppression
Changing demographics, combined with the three-year effort by state Republicans to suppress minority and youth turnout, led to close races. Originally published in The American Prospect. BY 12:30 a.m. WEDNESDAY, THE RALEIGH where North Carolina Democrats had earlier been whooping in anticipation of a presidential victory had nearly emptied out. Stragglers were sitting on the […]
His Own MAN
By challenging traditional ideas around academia, Mark Anthony Neal has broadened what it means to be a scholar. Originally published in Duke Magazine CLICK. A VIDEO OF R&B MUSICIAN Jill Scott fills the screen. She’s belting out “Strange Fruit,” a ballad written in the 1930s to protest the lynchings—hangings and other mob violence—that were terrorizing African-American communities. […]
Lifting the Emotional Embargo in Cuba
An unorthodox blend of anthropology and poetry is cultivating reunion and reconciliation among people and cultures that have been estranged for decades. Originally published in Sapiens. THE JUNE HEAT WAS SO INTENSE, the air so still, that the open balcony doors offered little relief. Anthropologist Ruth Behar felt her clothes sticking as she looked over […]
Reports from Moral Monday
During 2014, I reported on North Carolina’s Moral Monday movement, a faith-based organizing effort that is becoming a national model. The movement is spearheaded by the state NAACP with broad support from churches and issue-based organizations, including women’s, immigrant, environmental, LGBT, and labor groups. Most of the articles were published online by The American Prospect, illustrated by […]
The Death and Life of Detroit
Neighborhood groups are bringing the blighted city back, one block at a time. Will City Hall stand in their way? Originally published in The American Prospect. A SHIVERING KNOT OF COLLEGE STUDENTS stands outside Motor City Java House as John George unlocks the front door. It’s 15 degrees in Detroit on a February morning, and […]
Wealth for Everyone
Immigrants in Durham, N.C. had become easy targets for robbers. The community’s response: start its own wildly successful credit union. Originally published by One Nation Indivisible. NOT LONG AFTER HE ARRIVED in Durham, North Carolina in 1996, Marcelino Varela learned a lesson that would prove valuable in his adopted city: Always be ready to sprint. He […]
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