Insights
Our team and guest writers share perspectives on everything from reparations and justice to joy and resilience. We reflect on harm and healing, culture and community, offering readers a deeper look into the hearts and minds behind our work.
THOUGHTS
We turned Downtown Crossing into a dance floor for Embrace Massó ¡Con Salsa!
Just down the street from The Embrace monument and our new building in Downtown Crossing, we celebrated 1965 Freedom Plaza Honoree José Massó III and the 51st year of his radio show, ¡Con Salsa!, with the help of legendary orchestra El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico.
The Downtown I remember, The Downtown we can create
Downtown is the heart of the city. There is a photograph that still circulates across Boston social media of three young men, including Hip-Hop pioneer Rusty Pendleton, standing downtown with a boombox and dressed in the unmistakable uniform of the 1980s Hip-Hop generation. It captures the downtown I remember
The Number and the Names Behind It
Eight dollars is almost four rides on the T and barely enough to buy a Happy Meal at McDonald’s. It's also the number the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston put on paper a decade ago when it measured the median net worth of a U.S.-born Black Bostonian.
Eight dollars, full stop.
Talking the Chain of Ideas, America’s 250th anniversary with Ibram X. Kendi
Juneteenth has passed, but our celebration of Black culture doesn’t end there.
June also marks Black Music Month, first recognized under President Carter in 1979 to commemorate the multitude of ways Black music has shaped American life—its influence on popular genres like rock and roll and pop, its innovation and expression through hip hop culture, and its raw, radical messaging in the hands of truth-tellers like Billie Holiday.
Imari Paris Jeffries, Ta-Nehisi Coates talk 250 years of America
On Saturday at Faneuil Hall, Embrace President and CEO Imari Paris Jeffries, Ph.D., sat down with Ta-Nehisi Coates, author of Between the World and Me, The Message, and Black Panther, for an honest accounting of America’s first 250 years and a critical discussion about its next 250.
Reflecting on the Revolution at 250: A Fireside Chat with Ta-Nehisi Coates and Dr. Imari Paris Jeffries
A fireside chat with award‑winning writer and journalist Ta‑Nehisi Coates and Dr. Imari Paris Jeffries, president and CEO of Embrace Boston, reflecting on the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, Boston’s revolutionary legacy, and realizing the promises of the Revolution today.