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Rap group Public Enemy: (Clockwise from bottom left) Flavor Flav, Professor Griff, Terminator X, S1W, and Chuck D
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How Rap Taught (Some of) the Hip Hop Generation Black History

For members of the Hip Hop generation who came of age during the Black Power era, “reality rap” was an entry into the political power of Black history.
Naomi Oreskes, sitting with her hands resting on her knees

America's Toxic Romance With the Free Market

How market fundamentalists convinced Americans to loathe government.
Sacheen Littlefeather at the 45th Academy Awards, wearing Native dress and hairstyle

Sacheen Littlefeather and Ethnic Fraud

Why the truth is crucial, even it it means losing an American Indian hero.
Ink drawing of Buster Keaton's face against pale pink background

Keep Your Eye on the Kid

Buster Keaton made his own kind of sense out of the perplexities of existence in ways baffling to those among whom he found himself.
Exhibit

Moving Pictures

Tracing the history of Americans' relationships with the silver screen, from film's earliest days to the cinematic creations of our own times.

Image of the horse motion picture that is in the Jordan Peele film, "Nope."

What Jordan Peele’s ‘Nope’ Gets Wrong About ‘The Horse in Motion'

The film takes many liberties with the history of “the first motion picture,” but it illustrates how Black contributions are often marginalized.
Donald Duck with a U.S. military hat

How Disney Propaganda Shaped Life on the Home Front During WWII

A traveling exhibition traces how the animation studio mobilized to support the Allied war effort.
Photo of Ethel Barrymore over collage of citrus, eggs, and toast.

The Golden Age Hollywood Diet That Starved Its Famous Starlets — And Then America

In 1929, Ethel Barrymore went on the ‘18-Day Diet.’ From there, it took the country by storm. Until, that is, its disciples began dying.
1950s American family watching TV.

How American Culture Ate the World

A new book explains why Americans know so little about other countries.
Cover of an early Superman comic book.

The Vigilante World of Comic Books

A sweeping new history traces the rise of characters caught in a Manichaean struggle between good and evil.
Frame from the film Being the Ricardos, features Nicole Kidman as Lucille Ball and Javier Bardem as Desi Arnaz at a screen reading for the "I Love Lucy" show.

The True History Behind 'Being the Ricardos'

Aaron Sorkin's new film dramatizes three pivotal moments in the lives of comedy legends Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.
A graphic featuring illustrations of Stan Lee.

The Unheroic Life of Stan Lee

In a career of many flops, he laid claim to the outsized success of Marvel Comics.
Johnny Cash poses for a portrait for a publicity shot
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The Complications of “Outlaw Country”

Johnny Cash grappled with the many facets of the outlaw archetype in his feature acting debut, Five Minutes to Live.

Flu Fallout

A majority of the estimated 675,000 American deaths from the influenza pandemic of 1918–19 occurred during the second wave.

Watching “Watchmen” as a Descendant of the Tulsa Race Massacre

Who should be allowed to profit from depictions of traumatic events in Black history?

The Return of American Fascism

How a legacy of violent nationalism haunts the republic in the age of Trump.

The Long Reinvention of the South Bronx

Peter L'Official on the Mythologies Behind Urban Renewal.
Photo of KRS-One superimposed on photo of NY subway station in the Bronx

How KRS-One’s ‘Sound of Da Police’ Went From Anti-Cop Anthem to Theme Song and Back Again

The 1993 song reinvigorated the rap legend’s career — and against all odds became a Hollywood (and police) favorite
Still from animated TV show Big Mouth

The Messy Politics of Black Voices—and “Black Voice”—in American Animation

Cartoons have often been considered exempt from the country’s prejudices. In fact, they form a genre built on the marble and mud of racial signification.
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How Film Noir Tried to Scare Women out of Working

In the period immediately following World War II, the femme fatale embodied a host of male anxieties about gender roles.
Richard Pryor

A Nigger Un-Reconstructed: The Legacy of Richard Pryor

Comedian Richard Pryor's performance of Blackness throughout his career.
Joe Buck and Rizzo walking on a bridge.

How John Schlesinger’s Homeless and Lonesome ‘Midnight Cowboy’ Rode His Way to the Top

It became the first and only X-rated movie to win a best picture Oscar.

Ronald Reagan’s Reel Life

Did the movies ever matter? They did to Ronald Reagan.

Black Wall Street: The African American Haven That Burned and Then Rose From the Ashes

The story of Tulsa, Oklahoma’s Greenwood district isn’t well known, but it has never been told in a manner worthy of its importance.

Baldwin’s Lonely Country

After MLK's assassination, James Baldwin attempted to reconcile the divide between the civil rights movement and Black Power.
Still from Black Panther film.

'Black Panther' and the Invention of 'Africa'

The film's hero and antagonist represent dueling responses to five centuries of African exploitation at the hands of the West.
Thomas Hamblin

Reflections on 1830s Theater Manager Thomas Hamblin in the #MeToo Era

Over the 1830s, Hamblin transformed the fortunes of the Bowery by featuring melodramas starring young women, but this wasn't without issues.

Same As It Ever Was: Orientalism Forty Years Later

On Edward Said, othering, and the depictions of Arabs in America.

How John Wayne Became a Hollow Masculine Icon

The actor’s persona was inextricable from the toxic culture of Cold War machismo.

How Theaters and TV Networks are Changing the Way They Show Gone With the Wind

After almost 80 years, America is finally rethinking how it screens its favorite movie.
Billy Graham at a speaker's podium (Photo by Ninian Reid).

The Preacher and Vietnam: When Billy Graham Urged Nixon to Kill One Million People

The disclosure of Billy Graham's recommendation of war crimes did not exicte any commotion.

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