Artist Maurice Harris

‘I Am Deliberate and Afraid of Nothing’

Maurice Harris is a Los Angeles-based artist and founder of the floral design studio Bloom & Plume, and of a coffee shop with the same name. Before joining the panel for the Zócalo/Kinsey Collection event, “Can a Football Stadium Be a Black History Museum?,” he sat down in the green room at SoFi Stadium to tell us his thoughts on RuPaul, jacarandas, and some inspiring artworks.

| Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Poet aja monet

The Energy You Bring to a Word Can Heal or Harm

aja monet is a Surrealist Blues poet. Her 2023 debut poetry album, when the poems do what they do, was nominated for the Best Spoken Word Poetry Album Grammy. Before …

| Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Agent and Former NFL Player Jacques McClendon

There’s Nothing Like ‘Rocky Top’

Jacques McClendon is an agent with WME Sports and represents coaches and executives across professional and collegiate football. He previously spent seven years as an NFL player, and was most …

Why Shouldn’t Phillis Wheatley’s Poems Show Up at an NFL Game?

At Last Night’s Event—”Can a Football Stadium Be a Black History Museum?”—Panelists Argued to Democratize Culture

On the rarified second level of SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, amid premium owner suites and premium beer sales, there’s an Angela Davis quote plastered on a wall.

“Our histories never …

The Incredible Legacy of Newark’s Black Women Activists | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

The Incredible Legacy of Newark’s Black Women Activists

Harlem Renaissance Writer Brenda Ray Moryck and a New Jersey Community’s Untold Century of Intellectualism and Artistry

In 1927, Brenda Ray Moryck, a 32-year-old Black American woman from Newark, New Jersey, published a manifesto in Ebony and Topaz, a prominent Harlem Renaissance anthology of prose and poetry.

In …