The stories told about HIV and activism surrounding the virus are often incomplete, and focus solely on white gay men. But, as Jake Hall writes for High Snobiety, “the first person to die of AIDS in the US was a Black teenage boy named Robert Rayford.” This forgotten fact encapsulates how dominant narratives have excluded the toll of the virus on Black communities worldwide and …
Getty Images has opened access to their Black History & Culture Collection, which includes around 30,000 rare images of the Black diaspora in the UK and US. Free to use for not-for-profit or educational purposes, the collection spans the 19th century to today and includes 20 categories from politics to women’s empowerment, LGBTQ+, education, hair and more. To curate the images, Getty partnered with organizations …
In her first TED Talk, three-time Grammy-winner Lizzo traces the history of twerking to a West African dance called mapouka, traditionally performed by women to celebrate joy, marriage or as religious worship. When it was transported to America by Black women during the transatlantic slave trade, its ties to Black culture were erased and co-opted. But in Black communities around the US, big butts continued …
