Racism

Historian Kelly Lytle Hernandez has spent much of her career examining the connections between race, immigration, and the power of the state. In her new book 'Racist by Design: Two Centuries of US Immigration Control,' she traces the history of American immigration policy back more than two centuries, arguing that race has been central to the ways the nation has regulated who can enter, remain, and belong.

A Schenectady activist who serves on the city school district’s Board of Education says a December presentation is evidence of systemic racism within the educational institution.

(Airs 02/13/25 @ 3 p.m.) WAMC’s David Guistina in conversation with Alice Bufkin, Associate Executive Director for Policy and Advocacy at the Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York, part of the Campaign for Healthy Minds Healthy Kids – a coalition of behavioral health, mental health, and substance use providers, advocates and families - about the need to ensure that all children and adolescents in New York receive the high-quality behavioral health services they need.

“Colored Television” by Danzy Senna is a take on love and ambition, failure and reinvention, and the racial-identity-industrial complex. The book follows Jane, a novelist, as she struggles to create a picture-perfect life with her husband and kids. Jane learns being a writer is hard and working in Hollywood is even harder.

The Ku Klux Klan, which historian Fergus Bordewich defines as “the first organized terrorist movement in American history,” rose from the ashes of the Civil War. To repel the virulent tidal wave of violence, President Ulysses S. Grant waged a two-term battle against both armed Southern enemies of Reconstruction and Northern politicians seduced by visions of postwar conciliation, testing the limits of the federal government in determining the extent of states’ rights.Fergus Bordewich's new book is "Klan War."

On Saturday August 26 and Sunday August 27 at 8 p.m., The Tanglewood Learning Institute presents the play “American Moor” in Studio E at The Linde Center.Keith Hamilton Cobb's award-winning 2-person play explores the American Black Male experience via Shakespeare’s "Othello." The artists who originated the off-Broadway production created this version specially for Tanglewood's Studio E. The production is directed by Kim Weild.

Sadeqa Johnson is the award-winning author of four novels, including "Yellow Wife." Her latest, "The House of Eve," is a Reese’s Book Club Pick and an instant New York Times Bestseller. With their stories colliding in the most unexpected of ways, we meet Ruby and Eleanor who both make decisions that shape the trajectory of their lives.

Dr. Ibram X. Kendi is the Andrew Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University and the founding director of the BU Center for Antiracist Research. Kendi was recognized as one of TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People in the World, and awarded a 2021 MacArthur Fellowship, popularly known as the Genius Grant. He joins to to discuss the paperback release of his, "How to Raise an Antiracist" (One World).

Acclaimed New York Times bestselling author, Dennis Lehane’s latest, “Small Mercies” is a brutal depiction of criminality and power and an unflinching portrait of the dark heart of American racism. Mary Pat Fennessey, propelled by a desperate search for her missing daughter, begins turning over stones best left untouched.

In Malcolm X’s famous 1962 address, “Who Taught You to Hate Yourself?” he stated: “The most disrespected person in America is the Black woman. The most unprotected person in America is the Black woman. The most neglected person in America is the Black woman.” These words are central to Brianna Holt’s new book, “In Our Shoes: On Being a Young Black Woman in Not-So "Post-Racial" America.”