Ceremonies in Dark Old Men, a classic of American theater, is the poignant story of a family in 1950s Harlem. In timeless prose, Lonne Elder explores the discontent of a generation that has grown old before its time, and the determination of the next generation to avoid such a fate. In the play, Russel B. Parker is a prodigal father and failed barber who exists on memories and "ceremonies" for survival. He spends his time recounting atmospheric tales of his life in vaudeville and tells, in darkly comic detail, about his days on the chain gang. Just beneath the surface of Elder's work lie the terrors of day-to-day life in a racist society--never directly mentioned, but always simmering unforgettably. Ceremonies in Dark Old Men had its debut Off-Broadway in 1969. It received enthusiastic reviews and moved into an extended run. Since its first performance, the play has been produced numerous times both on television and on the stage, with the leads being played by an honor roll of actors, including Laurence Fishburne, Denzel Washington, and Billy Dee Williams.

LIFE Magazine is the treasured photographic magazine that chronicled the 20th Century. It now lives on at LIFE.com, the largest, most amazing collection of professional photography on the internet. Users can browse, search and view photos of today’s people and events. They have free access to share, print and post images for personal use.

Founded in 1943, Negro Digest (later “Black World”) was the publication that launched Johnson Publishing. During the most turbulent years of the civil rights movement, Negro Digest/Black World served as a critical vehicle for political thought for supporters of the movement.

At first glance, the Ford Foundation and the black power movement would make an unlikely partnership. After the Second World War, the renowned Foundation was the largest philanthropic organization in the United States and was dedicated to projects of liberal reform. Black power ideology, which promoted self-determination over color-blind assimilation, was often characterized as radical and divisive. But Foundation president McGeorge Bundy chose to engage rather than confront black power's challenge to racial liberalism through an ambitious, long-term strategy to foster the "social development" of racial minorities. The Ford Foundation not only bankrolled but originated many of the black power era's hallmark legacies: community control of public schools, ghetto-based economic development initiatives, and race-specific arts and cultural organizations. In Top Down, Karen Ferguson explores the consequences of this counterintuitive and unequal relationship between the liberal establishment and black activists and their ideas. In essence, the white liberal effort to reforge a national consensus on race had the effect of remaking racial liberalism from the top down—a domestication of black power ideology that still flourishes in current racial politics. Ultimately, this new racial liberalism would help foster a black leadership class—including Barack Obama—while accommodating the intractable inequality that first drew the Ford Foundation to address the "race problem."

Afrocentric Theatre updates the Molettes' groundbreaking book, Black Theatre: Premise and Presentation, that has been required reading in many Black theatre courses for over twenty-five years. Afrocentric theatre is a culturally-based art form, not a race-based one. Culture and values shape perceptions of such phenomena as time, space, heroism, reality, truth, and beauty. These culturally variable social constructions determine standards for evaluating and analyzing art and govern the way people perceive theatrical presentations as well as film and video drama. A play is not Afrocentric simply because it is by a Black playwright, or has Black characters, or addresses a Black theme or issue. Afrocentric Theatre describes the nature of an art form that embraces and disseminates African American culture and values. Further, it suggests a framework for interpreting andevaluating that art form and assesses the endeavors of dramatists who work from an Afrocentric perspective.

This book traces the history of African American theatre from its beginnings to the present.