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One of us is a doctor, the other a lawyer. We’re also members of a club that no woman ever asks to join, but too many are forced into, often by men they loved and trusted. JoDee Neil, a Texas attorney and former prosecutor, has spent her career seeking justice for survivors of sexual violence.
What if the beauty rituals trusted by millions carried hidden costs no one warned us about? This simple truth is the foundation of Rebundle founder Ciara Imani May’s film, Reclaimed: Beyond The Braid , about the normalized harm Black women face with braiding hair.
This year at ESSENCE Festival of Culture , HBCU pride is present in full force. Walk through the Convention Center or catch the energy outside the Superdome, and it is impossible to miss the sheer number of Black college students and alumni who treat this weekend less like a festival and more like a…
Back in April, Cardi B officially entered the beauty business with the launch of her first-ever haircare line, Grow-Good Beauty . But, going from Grammy Award-winning rapper to brand owner didn’t just work overnight (even though her hair masks do!) “I was tired of having chopped up hair,” she told T…
The ESSENCE Festival of Culture is always a sanctuary for Black women to release, rejoice, and find community, and this year’s Author’s Stage was no exception. Beating the New Orleans heat in the sweet relief of the Convention Center, an eager crowd gathered for a highly anticipated fireside chat wi…
“We all kind of share the same story,” said panelist Ava Pearl . On the live taping of Pearl’s Between Us Curls podcast at this year’s ESSENCE Festival , “there wasn’t a lot of representation growing up,” she told panel host and ESSENCE Senior Beauty Editor Akili King.
Now that the court has handed down its final opinions in argued cases for the 2025-26 term, Supreme Court observers must account not only for what has been decided but, on a lighter note, the most recent children’s book written by a justice.
The Supreme Court may not have reached its 250th birthday yet (that’ll take another 13 or so years ), but it has played a major role in shaping how the country understands the ideals contained in the Declaration of Independence. Happy Independence Day weekend to all.
Ashley Swain was standing in a room, about to learn something that would rearrange her sense of who she was, when her mind went somewhere unexpected: a dorm room at Spelman College, the night Barack Obama was elected president. “I’m going back to the moment when President Obama was first elected.
As the United States commemorates the 250th anniversary of its founding, there are many threads about how Americans of previous eras fought for bodily autonomy. Rewire News Group has been covering the ongoing fight for reproductive justice since our founding, offering a comprehensive historical pers…
Brandy is part of the 2026 Essence Festival of Culture lineup. Don’t miss out—tickets here: Get Tickets From vocals and acting to beauty, Brandy has long been in a league of her own. That’s why she’ll be honored at our Black Women In Music Luncheon this Sunday during Essence Festival, just one night…
New student loan rules took effect Wednesday — and the changes may heavily impact women pursuing higher education, particularly those in graduate programs like social work. Critics warn that the new guidelines, ushered in by the Trump administration’s sweeping tax-and-spending bill known as the “One…
There is a reality we seldom notice: the physical contortion constantly required and tolerated by women to get through the day. It’s everywhere if you pay attention: the woman struggling to reach and hold on to the strap on the moving subway car; the corporate attorney changing her gait to avoid bli…
Missy Elliott is part of the 2026 Essence Festival of Culture lineup. Don’t miss out—tickets here: Get Tickets “I was always just different,” reflected Missy Elliott to Brooklyn White in her 2023 ESSENCE cover interview .
We’ve made it to July—another eighth of the Trump administration’s days behind us, halfway through a hell of a long year, and the eve of a long weekend to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
This story was originally published by Rewire News Group , a national, nonprofit media organization exclusively dedicated to reporting on reproductive and sexual health, rights and justice. Since the nation’s independence, male sex workers have been intertwined with America’s history.
The Stat Pack is here! Jake S. Truscott and Adam Feldman crunched the numbers from the 2025-26 term and pulled together key takeaways. Scroll to the On Site section to learn more. Plus, do you know an exceptional lawyer looking for something different? We're hiring to help build a new editorial…
In 1965, the National Farm Workers Association announced their decision to join the striking Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee on Sept. 16—Mexican Independence Day. The choice of date reflected the hybrid identity of Chicanos: straddling Mexican and American cultures, Spanish and English, ro…
Free Black women and Indigenous women are the foremothers of generations of African Americans. Yet they remain largely absent from the official story of American freedom. Their lives, contributions and descendants have been systematically erased—from colonial records and legal classifications to pub…
Julie Shayne has spent the better part of her teaching career navigating campus politics made complicated by being a woman. Each semester, she once again finds herself on edge at the beginning of the Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies course she teaches.
Click to expand Image Security personnel stand guard as protesters gather outside the headquarters of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), demanding the organization leave the country and calling for an end to migrant settlement and the deportation of migrants and refugees, in …
Click to expand Image A rally in support of the extension of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian immigrants before it expires on February 3 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, US, January 28, 2026. © 2026 Lynne Sladky/AP Photo (Miami) – The Trump administration’s move to terminate Temporary Protec…
In the wake of a Supreme Court decision this week upholding the constitutional right to birthright citizenship , the Trump administration and fellow Republican immigration hardliners are exploring alternative routes to limit citizenship rights for children born within the United States to foreign to…
MAGA Republicans are back in the White House, and Project 2025 is their guide: the right-wing plan to turn back the clock on women’s rights, remove abortion access, and force women into roles as wives and mothers in the “ideal, natural family structure.
Trump Accounts, the president’s foray into free cash for American children, will officially launch on July 4, the nation’s 250th birthday. The accounts are designed to help families grow a savings for children from the time they’re born, capitalizing on the 20 years or so they presumably have before…
Each month, Ms. provides readers with a list of new books being published by writers from historically excluded groups. Dear feminist reader friends, I don’t ask you for much. But now, I want to hear from you.
ESSENCE Black Women in Music returns for the first time since 2018 with a class of honorees whose careers have left a lasting imprint on music and culture. Now, among them is Monica , a singer whose voice has remained a fixture in R&B for more than 30 years.
In the lead-up to our country’s 250th anniversary, Errin Haines is writing a series of columns to contemplate the complicated expansion of our democracy. Subscribe to The Amendment newsletter . Joseph and Nellie Gamble were born in 1905 and 1910 in Jim Crow Alabama – which meant that for much of the…
Nominated for Album of the Year at this year’s BET Awards, Wale’s eighth studio album Everything is A Lot. is his most personal yet. “ It’s one of my best bodies of work and the recognition from a Black institution is important to me,” he tells ESSENCE exclusively.
For much of my life, I thought belonging was something you found: a place, a community, a passport, a home. Now I believe belonging may be something we build together. That realization took me 30 years—and not because I lacked an identity. I arrived in the United States carrying one.
The Supreme Court’s decision in CISCO Systems, Inc. v. Doe , announced on June 23, was not only, as expected, good news for corporations that facilitate government violations of international human rights. It was also an unexpected boon for government officials who do so as well.
Acting legend Danny Glover shared in an exclusive interview with TODAY that he was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease a few years ago. His speech is beginning to slow, as well as his movements and memories, but he’s doing ok. “I can live with it in a sense,” Glover shared when asked how he’s coping.
Just over one month after giving birth to her first child with her partner, 21 Savage, Latto is headed to New Orleans to perform at this year’s Essence Festival. But first, the busy rapper arrived at the BET Awards to perfect a classic style: the bun.
Donald Trump’s jingoistic whitewashing of the 250th anniversary of the founding of our country will no doubt celebrate the 1773 Boston Tea Party, where the Sons of Liberty protested oppressive British import taxes.
Unknown block type "pdfEmbed", specify a component for it in the `components.types` option The final stretch of the 2025-26 Supreme Court term looked different from the end of recent ones. Over the past several years, many of the court’s most anticipated decisions have ended with the familiar 6-3 id…
For 250 years, the story of American democracy has been a story of expanding who holds power and who gets to decide who yields it. The 15th Amendment, the 17th, the Voting Rights Act, the 19th Amendment and the 26th—each was a structural intervention, a deliberate redesign of the rules to bring more…
The Morales family is growing—yet again. Married at First Sight Season 12 success story Briana Myles and Vincent Morales , the only couple from their Atlanta-based season still together, are expecting their third child.
It was a busy Tuesday at the court as the justices released the final opinions in argued cases for the 2025-26 term and then orders from their Monday conference. Let’s get to it. But first, do you know an exceptional lawyer looking for something different? We're hiring to help build a new edito…
Coca-Cola will mark its 31st consecutive year as a partner of the ESSENCE Festival of Culture this July, bringing what the company calls its largest and most integrated festival activation to date, complete with musical performances, HBCU programming, and community-focused experiences a cross the Ne…
Since the nation’s independence, male sex workers have been intertwined with America’s history. Their existence has been reviled, criminalized, and scapegoated, but rarely acknowledged openly. Throughout history, both women and men hired male sex workers to act out the desires that they couldn’t saf…
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