In Burying Don Imus, Awkward argues persuasively that Imus forgot “that big business and media corporations can tolerate association with virtually anyone who can increase their earnings or cultural capital . . . except a person widely recognized as a racist” (p. 135). But that is only part of Awkward’s story.

If the great problem of the twentieth century has been the problem of the color line, then a century later, the only color that seems to matter is green. In Everything But the Burden, Greg Tate and his team of writers take on various aspects of American popular culture, from Muhammad Ali to Pablo Picasso and imperialism, interracial sex, cornrows, pimpology, thugging, capitalistic exploitation, and racial transvestitism. As the title suggests, the underpinning thread of the text is that the only aspect of black culture that whites cannot appropriate is the burden of being black.

The greatest thing about public school is that it is, in fact, public. Anyone can attend and everyone has the opportunity to achieve. I have been a public school student and educator and I’ve had the privilege of encountering learners of all kinds: from brilliant artists, math whizzes and persuasive communicators to those who can barely read or need calculators to figure out the answer to 1 x 9. As a result, I think my experience in public education is similar to that of many of my dedicated colleagues across the nation: both highly rewarding and deeply depressing.

While conducting research for my forthcoming book on passing-- the fact of being accepted, or representing oneself successfully as, a member of a different group--I came across the amazing story of Ellen and William Craft. The Crafts were an enslaved couple who escaped when Ellen passed as Mr. Johnson--a wealthy, white, disabled master--who was attended by William, his slave in 1848. After a series of harrowing encounters aboard, trains, boats and carriage rides over the course of four days, the Crafts arrived in Philadelphia and ultimately escaped to London. The Crafts became what we might now call “reality stars” as they gained media attention from antislavery and mainstream press. They told their story in the book Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom, and donated the proceeds to further the abolitionist cause.

Even though the 21st century is seeing an exponential increase in reports of multiracial ancestry worldwide, exactly what makes a person multiracial remains a puzzling concept. According to advocacy groups like the Association of Multiethnic Americans and Project RACE, the definition of a(n) multiracial/interracial person is either someone whose parents were of more than one race or racial background, or someone who had parents that were of different racial groups. But what about those who identify with more than one racial background, irrespective of their parents’ identities? Or, those who identify with a racial background completely different from those of their parents?

Narratives of race and religion have been intertwined in headlines and the ideals of “a chosen people” and “a chosen nation.” These ideals, of various social groups and countries believing themselves to be selected uniquely by God to prosper, proselytize and lead, generate important questions for news media. Some of these questions are philosophical: How is religion practiced along racial and ethnic lines? Is religion used to justify racism and/or racial privilege? Does religion inherently resist racism? Others are practical: Is it the case that the more devout the religious practitioner, the more extreme the racial pride and/or racism?