Uptown Notes

For days, months, and years family and friends of Troy Davis have been praying that his execution would not occur. […]

“I think I’m Malcom X, Martin Luther/ Add a King, Add a Jr.” –Lupe Fiasco Building Minds Faster (B.M.F.) Recently, […]

“All the real OGs, I’m a solider cause you told me study Malcolm, Garvey, Huey/ Study Malcolm, Garvey, Huey, their life […]

Last week, I had the pleasure of being on NPR’s Tell Me More with host Michel Martin to discuss the […]

The recent buzz around education reform is growing, but silenced in this buzz is race. The amazingly taboo yet significant social phenomena is giving way to colorblind policy makers and educational activists. Can we truly transform an educational system if we don’t take account of one of its most enduring cleavages?

For the past few years, I have been diligently working on issues of inequality in well-resourced school settings. My book […]

As you may know, I support gay marriage (yes, it is a civil rights issue.) As you may also know, […]

Yesterday, protests at Ground Zero continued to gain international attention. What’s at issue is a figment of the American public’s imagination: the ground zero mosque. Herds of “well-intentioned” Americans flooded lower manhattan to chant down the construction of what they are calling a ground zero mosque, but what really is an Islamic community center. This case is a powerful lesson in framing, which I was first introduced to by the George Lakoff but you and I experience constantly. If we want to make sure The Community Center at Park 51 is built, we’ve got to re-frame the conversation, or else the Islamophobes have won!

“Justice for Oscar Grant!” As I sit in front of these keys I know that I could have written this […]

Recently, a firestorm surrounding Shirley Sherrod erupted. A spliced video of her speech ended in her force resignation from the USDA and condemnation by the NAACP. Following the debacle, there were multiple editorials and comments about the failures of the NAACP. While I completely agree the NAACP and USDA failed to respond appropriately to Sherrod, I don’t think the picture that has been painted of the NAACP is accurate or contemporary. Beneath I offer some reasons why and what it means for movement building.