Progress for black Americans depends on good schools because education is the last great equalizer.

Violence is black children going to school for 12 years and receiving 6 years' worth of education.

During the decades after Brown v. Board of Education there was terrific progress. Tens of thousands of public schools were integrated racially. During that time the gap between black and white achievement narrowed.

There is nothing of any consequence in education in the economy in city planning in social policy that does not concern black people.

A black agenda is jobs jobs jobs quality education investment in infrastructure and strong democratic regulation of corporations. The black agenda at its best looks at America from the vantage point of the least of these and asks what's best for all.

Education is indoctrination if you're white - subjugation if you're black.

The Washington black community was able to succeed beyond his wildest dreams. I mean we had our own newspapers our own restaurants our own theaters our own small shops our own clubs our own Masonic lodges.

I don't understand people who dream in black and white. I just don't get it. My dreams have always been vivid color.

Seems like God don't see fit to give the black man nothing but dreams - but He did give us children to make them dreams seem worthwhile.

For four to six months at a time I would barely eat. I lived on a diet of Melba toast carrots and black coffee.

We are not inferring design to account for a black box but to account for an open box.

I don't particularly follow the Bauhaus school of design where you make everything into a black box - simplify it.

'American Horror' goes for a very specific kind of Seventies suburban downer ambience - 'Flowers in the Attic' paperbacks Black Sabbath album covers and late-night flicks like 'Let's Scare Jessica to Death.' It even has 'Go Ask Alice'-era urban legends.

The earth is rocky and full of roots it's clay and it seems doomed and polluted but you dig little holes for the ugly shriveled bulbs throw in a handful of poppy seeds and cover it all over and you know you'll never see it again - it's death and clay and shrivel and your hands are nicked from the rocks your nails black with soil.

I miss my Dad. My Dad loved cheesy monster movies so we'd have Godzilla movie marathons. Those are some of my favorite memories laughing at how the monster outfits were so bad like black garbage bags for heads.

My Dad was so open creatively that I was off in search of black turtleneck bathing suits with long sleeves.

As much as I transferred my mother to Elizabeth Shore of The Black Dahlia as much as her dad mutated into an obsession with crime in general well I have thought about other things throughout the years.

My dad loved black singers. So listening to New Orleans music eventually I wanted to play an instrument.

My dad worked two jobs and moved us to the suburbs and just being a black person I went through a lot of racism and being called names and being bullied every single day. And it was hard. I didn't have any friends.

There is no glory in war yet from the blackness of its history there emerge vivid colours of human character and courage. Those who risked their lives to help their friends.

So the brother in black offers to these United States the source of courage that endures and laughter.

The cool wind blew in my face and all at once I felt as if I had shed dullness from myself. Before me lay a long gray line with a black mark down the center. The birds were singing. It was spring.

I grew up around hip-hop so I didn't think it was about being cool or being black or being white or whatever.

White people couldn't do black music back in the day because they weren't funky or bad enough. They weren't from the ghettoes but hip-hop and R&B changed all of that because white kids want to be down with it. They wanted to learn it so they studied the culture. It's kind of a cool thing because we shouldn't be so separate.