State Sen. Hansen Clarke will be hosting a town hall meeting open to the public on incentivizing student performance with leading Harvard Economics Professor Roland Fryer Jr.

Themed “Bridging the Educational Divide,” the town hall will be taking place from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History on Thursday, Aug. 13. The conversation
will begin with a question and answer session between Professor Fryer and Michigan Chronicle Senior Editor Bankole Thompson. Following this initial dialogue the audience will be invited to ask...

Within the parameters of hip-hop and rap music, rappers having beefs with each other is not uncommon.  Lately, it has also been used as a publicity stunt  or artists to boost record sales and win new fans.
   
However, Detroiter Leon Desmond’s interpretation of the infamous yet celebrated rap beef has won him some jail time.  
   
Barrett, 37,  has been arrested and charged by police for sending death threats to rap star/business mogul Jay-Z and his wife, superstar singer/actress Beyoncé Knowles.  He...

Born Curtis Walker in New York, he becme acquainted with music in the late ’70s  as a block party DJ and as a program director for City College of New York while a student there.  He also joined a music group called the Force, fronted by future hip-hop record company cofounder and business mogul Russell Simmons.

Simmons became Kurtis’ manager after he embarked on a career as a solo MC.    He was the first rapper to be signed to a major record company back during a time when rap was not wholly respected as art or acknowledged in mainstream radio....

Naomi Sims couldn’t have taken center stage at a more appropriate time.

The year was 1968 and the world as a whole was going through massive transformation that manifested in all corners of society.

For African-Americans, in particular, revolution was the keyword and years of racial and sexual prejudice were at their apex when a young Naomi Sims, an aspiring model, arrived in New York as a student of the Fashion Institute of Technology.

Her first attempts to be represented by modeling agencies were not successful.  They rejected her, saying that her...

By now you have likely heard about the bitter exchange of words (and more) between Mariah Carey and Eminem. They were rather briefly “involved” at one point, but it obviously went very sour, and the hostility has been turned up several notches in recent weeks.

It seems that Eminem got the ball rolling several albums back, and in the video for the new song “Obsessed,” Carey takes several pot shots, and prominently features a character that is supposed to be Eminem. Carey
says Eminem is “delusional.”

But in one of his new songs titled...