Portrait

Tippu Tip, a 19th-century Black trader, was one of the greatest slave merchants in African history. His path—marked by a commercial empire, colonial complicity,...

In 19th-century New Orleans, a free Black woman shook the powerful, healed the humble, and embodied the spiritual syncretism of African and Creole peoples....

He was a Crow chief, an army scout, a Rocky Mountains explorer — and yet his name has been erased from official accounts. Born...

She sang for Haiti, for Africa, for memory. Actress, activist, and priestess of the spoken word, Toto Bissainthe traversed exile and silence to give...

Poet of pain and priestess of resilience, Maya Angelou gave voice to the unspeakable with a pen of fire and a velvet voice. Through...

From London to Port of Spain, Michael X crossed the 1960s preaching Black emancipation while flirting with controversy. Activist, cultural icon, fugitive, and finally...

Arcahaie, May 18, 1803. The air is heavy, tension runs high. In a feverish silence, a woman busily sews what her godfather, Jean-Jacques Dessalines,...

Amadou Hampâté Bâ, writer, ethnologist, and African sage, dedicated his life to rescuing the oral traditions of West Africa from oblivion. From Bandiagara to...

An African American actor exiled in the Soviet Union, Wayland Rudd embodied the thwarted utopia of a life dedicated to art and equality. Caught...