Arts + Humanities

Harry Belafonte Harry Belafonte spent much of his childhood life in Jamaica. It was not until he came back to America after World War II though that he would be find his true calling. Belafonte earned his first leading role in Juno and the Paycock by auditioning for the part in the American Negro Theatre (A.N.T.). From [...]

E.J. Dionne A nationally known and respected commentator on politics, Dionne appears weekly on National Public Radio in a featured counterpoint to David Brooks for their review of politics, and regularly on MSNBC. He is a regular contributor to NBC’s Meet the Press. He has also appeared on News Hour with Jim Lehrer and other [...]

Darryl Van Leer Award-winning actor Darryl Van Leer has been captivating audiences for nearly two decades with his one-man dramatizations that he writes, directs, and produces. Van Leer's signature, high-energy tour-de-force performance, Power On Earth dramatizes key moments and events in the lives of eight prominent African-Americans of the 19th and 20th centuries. Led by [...]

Ice T Ice T is the original embodiment of LA Hip-Hop. Through his music, his book, “The Ice Opinion”, and his lecture tours of America’s prisons, high schools and colleges, speaking to thousands of students at over one hundred educational institutions (including Harvard, Berkley, Princeton, Stanford, and Northwestern), he has become an influential spokesman for [...]

Henry Rollins Many consider him the spokesperson of their generation. Others mark him as a hypocrite. In whatever light you see Henry Rollins, he’s made an undeniable impact on popular culture throughout his career. The last singer for the pivotal hard core band Black Flag, Rollins catapulted himself into the steady regimen of making music [...]

Darryl "DMC" McDaniels Darryl McDaniels, or DMC as most of the world knows him, helped transform the musical landscape as one-third of the trailblazing, multi-platinum rap group RUN-DMC. They sold more than 30 million albums and singles worldwide and the rest is now a matter of musical history. Since forming the legendary band with Joseph [...]

Spike Lee Throughout his career, Spike Lee has established himself as one of the country's most creative and talented producers, screenwriters, and directors. His forceful social vision, defined such films as Do the Right Thing, the epic Malcolm X, Miracle of St. Anna and the groundbreaking documentary film "When the Levees Broke", focusing on the [...]

Nikki Giovanni Essence magazine has called Nikki Giovanni “One of the most searning voices of the 1960’s Black Power movement”. Creating intimate, edgy and unapologetic works, she has long been known as the, “princess of black poetry”. Twenty years before the appearance of rap music, she made innovative recordings of her poems backed by some [...]

Stephanie Covington Armstrong Stephanie Covington Armstrong is a playwright and screenwriter. Her memoir, Not All Black Girls Know How to Eat, vividly describes her struggle as a black women with bulimia. Her battle with an eating disorder takes a unique perspective as this disease is consistently portrayed as a white women's problem. This insightful and [...]

Jean Kilbourne Jean Kilbourne is internationally known for her pioneering work on alcohol and tobacco advertising and the image of women in advertising. Through her illustrated lectures & her award-winning films and publications, Kilbourne explores the serious cumulative impact of advertising on individual attitudes, values, & behavior and on the society as a whole. With [...]