Tag Archives: Black

Nationality + Migration, Race + Color + Ethnicity

Norway Feature | American Immigrants of Color

Leave a comment

The Americans of Norway

With its strong social safety net and reputation for friendliness, Norway has had a lot to offer Americans of color who, because of work or relationships, have made a home in the Scandanavian country. Although Norway has had a long history of ethnic homogeneity, contemporary immigrants have begun to carve out a place for themselves as Norway joins the rest of Europe in diversifying. The Root shares the stories of a few American immigrants, who discuss racism, quality of life, and American privilege above the 57th parallel.

Read more:
“For Americans of Color, Is Norway a Racism-Free Utopia?” (The Root)

(Image Credit: Dayvee Sutton/The Root)

Race + Color + Ethnicity

Ukraine News | Black

Ukraine football team faces sanctions, assailants face charges after black fans attacked at Ukraine football match
  • At least four black individuals were attacked during an Oct. 27 Champions League match between Dynamo Kyiv and Chelsea.
  • The individuals–along with at least three white fans who came to their aid–were attacked in the stadium section of Dynamo’s Rodychi fan group.
  • While the assailants face charges of hooliganism, UEFA has initiated disciplinary action against the team for racist behavior by fans.

Read more:
“Dynamo Kiev consider calls to segregate black fans to prevent racism inside stadium” (The Telegraph)
“Dynamo Kyiv charged with racist behaviour of fans during Chelsea draw” (The Guardian)
“Attacks on Black Fans Show Tide of Fan Racism in Ukraine” (AP via ABC News)

Gender, Race + Color + Ethnicity

UK News | Racial Minorities & Women

British PM announces name-blind admissions and hiring measures, new gender pay equity policies
  • PM David Cameron announced that the UK’s University and College Admissions Service (UCAS) will switch to name-blind applicant evaluation in 2017 to reduce racial bias in college admissions.
  • Numerous studies have indicated that culturally inflected differences in names significantly impact job applicants’ likelihood of being hired, with those with names traditionally from black and other ethnic minority communities receiving fewer interviews.
  • Cameron also outlined new policies to address the gender pay gap, including forcing private companies to publish bonuses, requiring large public sector organizations to publish pay data, and pushing for the elimination of all-male FTSE-350 boards.

Read more:
“Ucas to enforce ‘name-blind’ applications to tackle racial bias” (The Guardian)
“The perfect name for a job application, based on biases” (BBC)

(Image Credit: David Cheskin/PA, via the Guardian)

Class + Socioeconomics, Nationality + Migration, Race + Color + Ethnicity

France Feature | Working Class, Immigrants & Racial Minorities

Estates of Emergency

France’s notorious housing estates–akin to housing projects in the U.S.–have long existed as symbols of an unintegrated France. Though President François Hollande has pledged to address the long-standing segregation that divides Paris’s poor banlieues from its more affluent city center, rampant unemployment, limited educational opportunities, crime, and stigmatization continue largely unchecked. The Guardian reflects on conditions in Paris’s most notorious estates a decade after riots forced what one banlieue mayor has called “social and territorial apartheid” into the national consciousness.

Read more:
“‘Nothing’s changed’: 10 years after French riots, banlieues remain in crisis” (The Guardian)

(Image Credit: Ed Alcock/The Guardian)

Race + Color + Ethnicity

Sweden News | Black Swedes

UN report finds increasing “Afrophobia” and discrimination against African-Swedes
  • A new UN report countered Sweden’s diversity-friendly image with data on discrimination faced by African-Swedes, who make up 2% of Sweden’s 9.6 million people.
  • In addition to discrimination in housing and employment, a national crime study found that hate crimes against people of African descent increased by more than 40% between 2008 and 2014, with a fifth of last year’s incidents involving violence.
  • Sweden has come under fire for several measures anti-racism advocates argue undermine their work, including removing the word “race” from the country’s Discrimination Act and the country’s failure to own up to its role in the transatlantic slave trade.

Read more:
“Sweden’s liberal reputation tarnished as race attacks rise” (The Guardian)
“Sweden’s liberal image is a mirage that hides a very ugly problem” (Quartz)
“Afrophobic hate crimes on the rise in Sweden” (The Local)

(Image Credit: Anders Wiklund/AFP/Getty Images, via The Guardian)

Race + Color + Ethnicity

UK News | Racial Minorities

Investigation finds London’s Metropolitan police force took no disciplinary action on more than 200 racial discrimination complaints over year
  • The Met received 245 complaints of racial discrimination by police officers between March 2014 and February 2015, with five resulting in managerial action and the rest being dismissed.
  • Complaints were often dismissed as “poor communication,” although five officers received three or more allegations of discrimination.
  • The police force is looking to address fraught relations with London’s ethnic minority communities as only 11% of its ranks come from minority backgrounds while 40% of London’s population does.

“[The Met is] shown to be effectively immune from any accountability. We need a truly independent body that carries the confidence of the communities affected by police abuses of power. The police cannot be trusted to investigate themselves.”

Read more:
“No racial discrimination complaints against Met police upheld” (The Guardian)
“Met chief admits institutional racism claims have ‘some justification’” (The Guardian)

(Image Credit: Oli Scarff/Getty Images, via the Guardian)

Race + Color + Ethnicity

U.S. News | Black Americans

Thousands gather in Washington D.C. for “Justice or Else” rally commemorating 20th anniversary of the Million Man March
  • Black leaders, celebrities, and community members joined in a march to the National Mall as a return to the public forum on Black community issues, with black women and children joining men in the movement for social justice.
  • As he did twenty years earlier, Louis Farrakhan fronted the event, touching on the issues of communal responsibility, reproductive rights, and economic boycotting in his speech.
  • Other speakers spoke about the current movement for criminal justice reform and inter-communal and international issues, including women’s rights, Native American solidarity, and Palestine.

Read more:
“‘Justice or Else’ Rally Marks 20th Anniversary of Million Man March” (Voice of America)
“History in the Making: Million Man March 20th Anniversary” (The Root)
“20 years after the Million Man March, a fresh call for justice on the Mall” (Washington Post)
“Million Man March Activists Chant Kendrick Lamar’s ‘Alright’ on 20th Anniversary” (Billboard)

(Image Credit: AP, via Voice of America)

Race + Color + Ethnicity

Brazil Feature | Black Brazilians

Video

Brazilian TV’s Race Problem

With the slow emergence of a black middle class in the country, demands have grown for more and better media representation among Brazil’s majority black and mixed-race population. Television has become a prime battleground for visibility and equal representation as Brazil continues the difficult process of shedding its history of racial repression. The Guardian takes a look at Mister Brau, Brazil’s new musical comedy at the forefront of that battle, its popular stars, and the cultural landscape it’s making a statement in.

Read more:
“Brazilian television slowly confronts country’s deeply entrenched race issues” (The Guardian)

Other coverage:
“Groundbreaking New Series – ‘Mister Brau’ – Gives Afro-Brazilians Representations to Cheer Despite Flaws” (Indiewire)

(Image Credit: Corbis & Getty Images, via The Guardian)

Race + Color + Ethnicity

Ecuador News | Afro-Ecuadorians

Ecuador government passes resolution to include Afro-Ecuadorian history in textbooks
  • As Ecuadoreans around the country celebrate National Day of the Afro-Ecuadorian People, the government announced the new education measure to foster inclusion of Afro-Ecuadorians in the nation’s history.
  • Afro-Ecuadorians number more than 600,000 in the country, but continue to face discrimination and economic difficulty.
  • The National Day of the Afro-Ecuadorian People began with the 1997 congressional declaration of the National Day of the Black Ecuadorian, symbolized by celebration of fugitive slave leader Alonso de Illescas and Afro-Ecuadorian history and culture.

“On this day we have to remember all the contributions we have made as a people and bring it, together with our history, to the rest of the people because many don’t know it, which enables a lot of forms of discrimination.”

Read more:
“Ecuador to Include Afro-Ecuadorean History in Textbooks” (teleSUR English)

(Image Credit: El Telegrafo, via teleSUR)

Race + Color + Ethnicity

U.K. Research | Ethnic Minorities

Sports Participation Among Minorities in Wales

Sports Wales recently conducted a study of Black, Asian, and ethnic minority participation in sports in Wales and found disproportionately low levels of engagement. The research found that ethnic minorities were less likely to participate as players or as volunteers, administrators, or spectators, causing concern because of the traditional conception of athletics as an inclusive cultural activity.

4.5%

Percentage of Wales’s population that is of a minority ethnic background

Lower incomes, limited time, limited mobility, limited facilities, racism, and language barriers

Reasons study cites for lower levels of participation

£3 million

Amount of funding earmarked for tackling inequality in sports (with £1.5 million specifically targeting racial and ethnic inequality)

Read more:
“Black and ethnic minorities face barriers to sport, report says“ (BBC)
“BAME communities in Wales face sporting barriers” (The Voice)
Calls 4 Action: Black and Minority Ethnic Pupils – what do we know? (Sports Wales)

Age, Gender, Nationality + Migration, Race + Color + Ethnicity

U.S. News | Haitian Immigrant Youth

In Search of Home

After the 2010 earthquake that devastated much of their country’s infrastructure, thousands of Haitians immigrated to the U.S. in search of a place to rebuild their lives. However, the traumatic psychological and material effects of the catastrophe made integration into their new homes difficult. PRI profiles efforts in Boston, home to one of the biggest Haitian-American communities in the U.S., to provide a space of transition for Haitian boys in search of familiarity.

Read more:
“A ‘home’ away from home is helping young Haitians in the US cope with trauma of 2010 earthquake” (Public Radio International)

(Image Credit: Rupa Shenoy/WGBH, via PRI)

Nationality + Migration, Race + Color + Ethnicity

Jamaica News | Jamaicans

Jamaican leaders find no traction on reparations issue with U.K. PM
  • British PM David Cameron rejected calls from Jamaican PM Portia Simpson Miller and other Caribbean leaders for reparations and an unconditional apology during his recent visit to Jamaica, the first by a British PM in 14 years.
  • Caribbean leaders have chronicled the long-term economic damages that the lack of reparations following Britain’s 1833 emancipation of the enslaved has inflicted on their national economies.
  • The call for reparations in the Caribbean has been particularly strong in the region because of the significant financial compensation offered to slave owners at the time of emancipation.

Read more:
“David Cameron rules out slavery reparation during Jamaica visit” (BBC)
“Apologise for slavery! – Reparations committee wants David Cameron to say sorry for wrongs of UK past” (The Gleaner)
“David Cameron Grapples With Issue of Slavery Reparations in Jamaica” (The New York Times)
“Britain, Jamaica, and the Looming Battle Over Reparations” (The Atlantic)

(Image Credit: Francois Lenoir/Reuters, via The Atlantic)

Age, Race + Color + Ethnicity

South Africa Feature | Black

South African Higher Ed’s Race Problem

Image Credit: Joao Silva/The New York Times
Image Credit: Joao Silva/The New York Times

Black students at South Africa’s preeminent universities have taken to protesting the slow pace of diversification in the institutions. Gaining momentum at schools like the University of Cape Town and Stellenbosch, the movement has taken up issues ranging from affirmative action to faculty hiring, with students engaging in sit-ins, readings, and demonstrations to draw attention to the overwhelmingly disproportionate racial demographics and culture of South African universities. The New York Times profiles students leading the way for change and the challenges facing the movement.

Read the full feature at the New York Times.

Race + Color + Ethnicity

Spain & Netherlands News | Black

Spain and the Netherlands look to phase out blackface Christmas traditions
  • Madrid authorities announced that they will cast an actual black person in the role of Balthazar this year rather than continue the tradition of blackening the face of a white person.
  • In The Hague, education officials announced that elementary schools will no longer engage in the “Black Pete” tradition, which paints Santa’s helpers in blackface.
  • While cities across Spain are increasingly abolishing holiday blackface, the Netherlands has seen staunch resistance, with a majority of its citizens rejecting the idea that Black Pete is a racist practice.

“This change is much more than just anecdotal. … Given the increasingly large community of colour in our city, it seems absurd that this role continues to be represented by a person with their face blackened.”

Read the full story at the Guardian.

(Image Credit: Peter Dejong/AP, via The Guardian)

Gender, Race + Color + Ethnicity

Latin America & the Caribbean Feature | Afro-Latinas

The Summer of the Afro-Latina

Image Credit: planeta-afro.org, via Global Voices
Image Credit: planeta-afro.org, via Global Voices

Summer 2015 saw a flurry of activities as Afro-Latina advocates and organizations united in forums and campaigns addressing the racial, ethnic, and gender discrimination experienced by women of African descent throughout Latin America. Events including the Afro-descendant Women Leaders of America Summit and advocates including bloggers, Descato Feminista (Feminist Contempt), Teatro en Sepia (Theater in Sepia), and the Red de Mujeres Afro-Latinoamericanas Afro-Caribeña y de la Diáspora (Network of Afro-Latin American and Afro-Caribbean Women of the Diaspora) focused on issues including gender-based violence, domestic labor, and political representation. Global Voices explores the busy summer for Afro-Latina advocacy.

View the feature at Global Voices.