Race & Identity

Is racism universal? Since the end of the colonial era, the rising powers of the developing world have been quick to condemn Western racism. Ethnocentrism and color prejudice can be found in virtually all human societies, going back centuries if not thousands of years.

It's not unusual for a global city to recruit an international talent like Gustavo Dudamel to conduct its symphony orchestra. (Alan Gilbert, the new conductor of the New York Philharmonic, is the first native New Yorker to hold the post since the institution was founded in 1842.) What is unusual is how the Los Angeles orchestra is using the high-culture, Venezuelan-born wunderkind to build a rapport with this city's native-born Latino masses. Gauging from the widespread, deliriously upbeat hoopla -- and taking into account Dudamel's

... the detained immigrants ... suggests that rounding up all illegal immigrants is not at all feasible," says Tomas Jimenez of the New America Foundation. ...

Just about any celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month (September 15 - October 15) will highlight the diversity among Hispanics.

They come from different parts of the Spanish-speaking world, have settled in various areas of the United States, have distinctive customs and come in all shapes and colors.

But an often overlooked difference among Hispanics relates to how many generations back they trace their roots in U.S. history.

The Congressional Black Caucus is 40 years old this year, and with one of its former members in the White House, members are feeling more powerful than ever. As the CBC gathers in Washington for its annual legislative conference weekend-the first since Barack Obama was elected president-some members say the CBC, with a record 43 members, may be more influential now than at anytime in its history. 

Barack Obama had no choice but to disagree with Jimmy Carter. Carter called some of Obama's most hysterical critics racist. But our first nonwhite president once again tried hard not to be sucked into a racial uproar. As much as he and his liberal allies like to declare that Americans need to hash out racial issues publicly, the subject of race can only damage his presidency.

During a wide-ranging interview with John King of CNN, President Barack Obama distanced himself from former President Jimmy Carter's contention that the recent surge of opposition to big government is motivated by racism. Rather, the president observed that the debate over the size and scope of the federal government has been ferocious since the days of Andrew Jackson. And to his credit, he noted that harsh language has been used not just to condemn the partisans of government expansion, like FDR, who was also derided as a… more

A "fan" of what he calls "The Obama Show," the Cos says if you can't be a doctor, at least be an electrician.

For eight television seasons (NBC, 1984-92), the Emmy Award-winning The Cosby Show, written by and starring comedian Bill Cosby, beamed an unflinching, yet humorous black family portrait into living rooms across America. Cosby, as Dr. Heathcliff Huxtable, presided over this historic foray into black upper-middle class life. The sitcom was a window into a certain, often enviable kind of black familial and romantic love, a showcase for amazing talent and a place where the situations or “problems” of a