The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850: Annotated
The Fugitive Slave Act erased the most basic of constitutional rights for enslaved people and incentivized US Commissioners to support kidnappers.
The Indelible Lessons of Erasure
A Percival Everett fan weighs in on the novelist’s approach to racial satire and considers the translation of Erasure to the big screen in American Fiction.
The First Black American to Reach the North Pole
Matthew Henson partnered with Robert Peary on seven Arctic adventures, but their final success brought an end to a longstanding collaboration.
“A Time To Speak”: Annotated
On September 15, 1963, a bomb killed four Black children in Birmingham, Alabama. Who threw that bomb? Each of us, argued Birmingham lawyer Charles Morgan, Jr.
EV Cars: Can We Electrify Our Way Out of the Climate Crisis?
The transition to personal electric vehicles in the United States is a cornerstone of the plan to decarbonize transportation. But will it work?
Climate Justice in the Anthropocene: An Introductory Reading List
Justice discourse in the Anthropocene has shown us that perhaps we aren't as homogeneous of an “Anthros” as we’d expect.
The Debtor’s Blues: Music and Forced Labor
Debt peonage is often associated with agricultural labor, but in the early twentieth century, Black musicians found themselves trapped in its exploitative cycle.
“I Have a Dream”: Annotated
Martin Luther King, Jr.'s iconic speech, annotated with relevant scholarship on the literary, political, and religious roots of his words.
George Washington Williams and the Origins of Anti-Imperialism
Initially supportive of Belgian King Leopold II’s claim to have created a “free state” of Congo, Williams changed his mind when he saw the horrors of empire.
How the Black Labor Movement Envisioned Liberty
To Reconstruction-era Black republicans, the key to preserving the country’s character was stopping the rise of a wage economy.