Why is Ethnic Studies Important?

In this video, photojournalist Ben DeSoto discusses "Understanding Poverty," an exhibit featuring images of people and communities affected by poverty and homelessness.

In this excerpt from his memoir, Rodriguez provides a stirring recollection from his adolescence: the first time he experienced racism as a result of being an immigrant in America. As he says, the experience "stays with [him] like a foul odor."

You can see, hear, feel, and taste the injustice, frustration, and naiveté experienced at this ladies' get together.

In this poem, the speaker explores how our culture would be lacking—in people, in music, in movements, in contributions—without contributions of African Americans.

In this poem, the speaker--who is Native American--responds to a series of unspoken discriminatory questions. The reader can deduce the missing questions based on the speaker's responses.

In this poem, a black woman carefully analyzes her interaction with a white waitress, whose actions, although civil, are smoldering with superiority.

Linda Schubert recounts the fear that consumed her Jewish family living in Nazi-Germany in the late 1930s. Each family member endured individual stress and anxiety, but each also contributed to the family's greater good of the family.

After her father's death, Esperanza and her mother are left with few options and forced to flee to America. The immigration officers are only the first obstacle they must face. Beyond them, the Great Depression and an uncertain future awaits.

In this video, young people reflect on society's rules for what males and females can and cannot do.

This graphic from Mother Jones magazine depicts income inequality in the United States.

In this cartoon, Emad Hajjaj illustrates religious extremism and the role of interfaith relationships.

This excerpt explains that families are defined by love, caring and sharing, not the number or gender of its members.

This cartoon challenges assumptions that all men who wear turbans are affiliated with terrorist organizations.

This excerpt focuses on the lives of African-American students during the civil rights movement. After reading Dr. Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech in class in 1963, students in main character C.J.'s school are asked to share their dreams at a school assembly.

Rosie Molinary describes how she felt as a Latina teenager in the United States, caught between disparate and unrealistic beauty standards.

Solomon Northup was kidnapped and sold into slavery for 12 years before he was freed. This excerpt from his memoir of those years, Twelve Years A Slave, details a New Orleans slave auction.

In this blog post, the author details the internal struggle she feels when coming to terms with the bloody heritage she shares with conquistadors like Christopher Columbus and the pride she takes in remembering, embracing and living out her cultural history.

The distrust between the Jewish community and African-American community in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn in the 1990s reached an all-time high when a runaway car struck two children.

In this essay, the author identifies vague terminology used by the United States government during World War II to describe their actions toward Japanese Americans and outlines terms that would more appropriately describe the government's actions.

This graphic from Mother Jones depicts income inequality in the United States.

In their trek from Mexico to the U.S. border, this young group is reminded that dangers lurk beneath them and hang over their heads every day and every night.