Race
Profiles
The Formidable Charm of Omar Sy
How the star of “Lupin” pulled off his greatest confidence trick.
Annals of Inquiry
What Do Conservatives Fear About Critical Race Theory?
In the Texas legislature, Republicans seemed willing to acknowledge systemic racism but resistant to the idea of talking about it with children.
Profiles
Mickey Guyton Takes On the Overwhelming Whiteness of Country Music
The “Black Like Me” singer was always told she didn’t fit the genre, so she made it her own.
The Sporting Scene
LeBron James’s Agent Is Transforming the Business of Basketball
Rich Paul is known for driving hard bargains for star clients, giving them new power in the N.B.A.
Daily Comment
George Floyd, the Tulsa Massacre, and Memorial Days
The two tragedies make for easy inferences about the importance of commemoration. But this is not how trauma works.
A Critic at Large
From Guns to Gay Marriage, How Did Rights Take Over Politics?
The N.R.A., the Supreme Court, and the forces driving the country’s most intractable legal debates.
Closeup Dept.
Tracing the African Diaspora in Food
Jessica B. Harris, the author of the book “High on the Hog,” which has been adapted for Netflix, searches for the roots of African-American cuisine, like the dishes at Reverence, a tasting-menu restaurant in Harlem.
On Television
The Achievement of Barry Jenkins’s “The Underground Railroad”
We have known Jenkins as a portraitist. In his reimagining of Colson Whitehead’s novel, he is a virtuosic landscape artist.
Our Columnists
The Emerging Movement for Police and Prison Abolition
Mariame Kaba, a New York City-based activist and organizer, is at the center of an effort to “build up another world.”
Reflections
An Artist on How He Survived the Chain Gang
You have to play a role that isn’t really you. It’s like slavery. You have to meet all those demands and keep a sense of yourself as well.
Life and Letters
Nathaniel Mackey’s Long Song
Listening to music with the poet whose alternative history of humankind intersects with the realities of Black life in America.
Cultural Comment
The Squandered Promise of Chet Hanks’s White-Boy Summer
Perhaps, in the end, we weren’t nearly as ready for it as we might have wanted to be.
Annals of Fashion
Ann Lowe’s Barrier-Breaking Mid-Century Couture
How a Black designer made her way among the white élite.
Poems
“Study of Two Figures (Dr. Seuss / Chrysanthemum-Pearl)”
A poet reckons with Theodor Geisel’s fraught legacy—and with the story of his imaginary daughter.
Culture Desk
Black and White
“There was a parade of cheap TV sets that made their way through my home when I was a kid.”
The Art World
Sorrows of Black America
A show of leading Black artists at the New Museum powerfully channels emotional tenors that are true to the history—and the future—of race in this country.
Performance
Acting Black and White Onscreen
Race as a performance in “Passing” and “The United States vs. Billie Holiday.”
The Front Row
“Malcolm & Marie,” Reviewed: A Film About Filmmaking That’s Desperate to Push Buttons
The tangle of art and life gets a vanity workout amid the pandemic lockdown.
American Chronicles
The Plan to Build a Capital for Black Capitalism
In 1969, an activist set out to build an African-American metropolis from scratch. What would have happened if Soul City had succeeded?