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By TOLLEY M. JONES

“If you think we live in the land of the free, you should try to be black like me.” — Mickey GuytonHave you ever been told as a child you can’t possibly be as smart as you are? Have you ever been accused of cheating because your test scores were...

By TOLLEY M. JONES

The other day I was in my office working on a grant report with my door closed, when suddenly loud and joyous laughter exploded in the hallway. My fellow brown female coworkers were laughing the way brown women laugh when they are surrounded by other...

By TOLLEY M. JONES

My grandmother Esther died on November 17th at the age of 95. Grandma had five children: Charles, Patricia, Michael, David, and Valerie. Tragically, she buried four of her five children as adults — one of whom was murdered, along with that adult...

By TOLLEY M. JONES

Music has been a deeply integral part of the Black American experience since the first African set stolen foot on hostile and punishing American soil. It connected kidnapped Africans to the families and cultures from which and from whom they were...

By TOLLEY M. JONES

My little brother is a tall, Black man who has a penchant for wearing all black, including a signature mysterious-looking black fedora, but he was a timid, gentle kid. Once when our entire neighborhood of kids saw a single lost sunfish wandering...

By TOLLEY M. JONES

“What upon Earth is the matter with the American people? Do they really covet the world’s ridicule as well as their own social and political ruin?”― Frederick DouglassI am still so tired.I am tired of having so many upsetting and horrible things...

By TOLLEY M. JONES

One recent blustery February afternoon, my partner and I took a walk through the Common Burying Ground in Newport, Rhode Island. Established in 1640, it contains 31 acres of Colonial headstones.We walked, leaning into the sharp ocean gusts that...