The Language Lane

Baldwin indeed returns although no conversation occurs yet between him and Shakur. However, Baldwin delivers another speech, before the...

On a recent episode of Raising Kanan , the character B-Rilla visits the book shop of Kenyatta, who emerges from the back reciting lines...

Percival Everett’s James  is the latest in a line of prominent novels by African Americans that features language and literacy struggles...

Rough action on the language front as Donald Trump continues to fire directives from his right-wing playbook. First, he issued an...

Author’s Note: The Promise of Language has a different purpose than my previous memoir writing, most notably Voices of the Self: A Study...

In March 1969, the Fisk graduate made a literary splash in New York City as she promoted her new volume of poetry, Black Judgement ....

While operating within a lifelong lyrical odyssey, his journey to build “roads of odes” (22), Sterling Plumpp checks in with his new...

I feel some type of way about certain kinds of electioneering. First off, they are using my first name, which I rarely use and never...

As Republicans and Democrats agree, this election discourse is weird. For one, Republican pundits are shook. They know it’s impossible to...

I bet that Kamala Harris makes it through the storms of definitions and labels and arrives safely in the White House. Political enemies...

“Glad to be out for convo and the coldest beer,” exclaimed Semple Jenkins, seated next to Boyd at their favorite bar. “Heat wave had me...

By now, most media followers have heard about how the house was set afire, that is, the House Oversight Committee. Convened to discuss a...

Scottie Scheffler was arrested in Louisville for disobeying a detective’s traffic command and dragging him 30 feet, causing injuries....

When my students and I read Sing, Unburied, Sing, we were aware that author Jesmyn Ward had Toni Morrison’s Beloved (which one or two...

The success of the excellent movie American Fiction has brought renewed attention to Percival Everett’s Erasure, the 2001 novel on which...

When I saw a teenage Beyoncé play the lead in Carmen: A Hip Hopera, which was made for MTV, I figured there was no limit to how big a...

As I turned back into the Language Lane, I was reminded of the continual vibrancy of African American Language when I was watching the...

Unless it’s going to be all war all the time in the land of old Palestine, a political solution must be sought. That a viable one to...

Reflecting on the World Athletics Championships recently concluded in Budapest, I find that I enjoyed a few of the language performances...

I have been off the block too long. I admit to being confused when I saw that the boxer Shakur Stevenson called out fellow boxer Vasiliy...