A trip to Israel and Palestine in 2023 made Coates rethink one of his most famous essays.

Is the American experiment doomed?

Edda L. Fields-Black sets out to restore the Combahee River Raid to its proper place in Tubman’s life and in the war on slavery.

In acknowledging slavery's role in the conflict, the presidential aspirant made clear the freedom she spoke about was that of the enslavers.

Researching public figures’ families is much easier than it used to be—but that doesn’t mean it’s inherently enlightening.

Two new books ask us to shift our attention away from the white vigilantes of Jim Crow and instead focus on what it meant for the survivors.

An astonishing one-third of Capitol artworks depict slaveholders. Will they remain? It’s largely up to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

Recent critiques of “presentism” fail to see that we can’t divorce the past from the present—and that supposedly objective scholarship has long promoted racist narratives and suppressed Black history.

Kris Manjapra’s new book, “Black Ghost of Empire,” examines the ways white slaveholders were compensated, while formerly enslaved people were not.

The conservative hysteria over critical race theory is ultimately a refusal to acknowledge that the country’s classrooms have always taught a white-centric view of U.S. history.

Juneteenth is an opportunity to recover the possibilities of history

Long before Southern Democrats filibustered Civil Rights legislation, “filibusteros” were conquering slave territories for the United States.

The Biden administration is reviving the legal and moral case for slavery reparations.

After Charlottesville, the historian Joan Wallach Scott wanted to find out how societies face up to their past—and why some fail.

The Capitol insurrection was born of a violent minoritarian tradition that is as American as apple pie—and it isn’t done yet.

A turn toward nationalism following the MAGA storm on D.C. erases the Black radical tradition of rebellion—and endangers its future.

Three new books show how Northern states betrayed Black people, and why many found Mexico a safer destination.

Isabel Wilkerson compares American racism to structures of oppression in India and Nazi Germany.

In “Transcendent Kingdom,” a young Black woman refuses to be defined by other people’s narratives.

The millionaire players’ anti-racist protest shows how race and class are intertwined for Black Americans.