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- Teaching Hard History
Why Hard History Matters: Addressing the Legacy of Jim Crow
Episode 16, Season 4 Congressman Hakeem Jeffries represents New York’s 8th congressional district. Our final episode this season takes us to the U.S. House of Representatives for a conversation between Rep. Jeffries and his brother, our host, Dr. Hasan Jeffries, to discuss the lingering effects of the Jim Crow era—including voter access, prison and policing…
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- Teaching Hard History
Music Reconstructed: Lara Downes’ Classical Perspective on Jim Crow
Installment 4 From concertos to operas, Black composers captured the changes and challenges facing African Americans during Jim Crow. Renowned classical pianist Lara Downes is bringing new appreciation to the works of artists like Florence Price and Scott Joplin. In our final installment of Music Reconstructed, Downes discusses how we can hear the complicated history…
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- Teaching Hard History
Music Reconstructed: Adia Victoria and the Landscape of the Blues
Installment 3 When we consider the trauma of white supremacy during the Jim Crow era—what writer Ralph Ellison describes as “the brutal experience”—it’s important to understand the resilience and joy that sustained Black communities. We can experience that all through the “near-comic, near-tragic lyricism” of the blues. In part 3 of this series, acclaimed musician,…
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- Teaching Hard History
Black Political Thought
Episode 14, Season 4 Black political ideologies in the early 20th century evolved against a backdrop of derogatory stereotypes and racial terrorism. Starting with Marcus Garvey and the Universal Negro Improvement Agency, historian Minkah Makalani contextualizes an era of Black intellectualism. From common goals of racial unity to fierce debates over methods, he shows how…
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- Teaching Hard History
Music Reconstructed: Dom Flemons, Black Cowboys and the American West
Installment 2 From ranches to railroads, learn about the often unrecognized role that African Americans played in the range cattle industry, as Pullman porters and in law enforcement. In part two of this special series, Grammy Award-winner Dom Flemons takes us on a musical exploration of the American West after emancipation. “The American Songster” joins…
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- Teaching Hard History
Medical Racism: A Legacy of Malpractice
Episode 13, Season 4 This nation has a long history of exploiting Black Americans in the name of medicine. A practice which began with the Founding Fathers using individual enslaved persons for gruesome experimentation evolved into state-sanctioned injustices such as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, among others. Award-winning historian Dr. Deirdre Cooper Owens details a chronology…
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- Teaching Hard History
Criminalizing Blackness: Prisons, Police and Jim Crow
Episode 15, Season 4 After emancipation, aspects of the legal system were reshaped to maintain control of Black lives and labor. Historian Robert T. Chase outlines the evolution of convict leasing in the prison system. And historian Brandon T. Jett explores the commercial factors behind the transition from extra-legal lynchings to police enforcement of the…
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- Teaching Hard History
Music Reconstructed: Jason Moran, Jazz and the Harlem Hellfighters
Installment 1 This is a special four-part series where historian Charles L. Hughes introduces us to musicians who are exploring the sounds, songs and stories of the Jim Crow era. In this installment, jazz pianist Jason Moran discusses his acclaimed musical celebration of a man he calls “Big Bang of Jazz,” bandleader, arranger and composer…
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- Teaching Hard History
The Harlem Renaissance: Restructuring, Rebirth and Reckoning
Episode 12, Season 4 During the Harlem Renaissance, more Black artists than ever before were asking key questions about the role of art in society. Oftentimes the Harlem Renaissance is misconstrued as a discrete moment in American history–not as the next iteration of a thriving Black artistic tradition that it was. Literature scholar Julie Buckner…
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- Teaching Hard History
Changing the Game: Sports in the Jim Crow Era
Episode 11, Season 4 In the United States, Black athletes have had to contend with two sets of rules: those of the game and those of a racist society. While they dealt with 20th century realities of breaking the color line and the politics of respectability, Black fans, educational institutions, and the Black press were…
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