Author Archives: Elahe Izadi

October 25, 2011 | 9:30 AM | By

Black Mom, White Sons

A disproportionate number of black children are available for adoption, and most transracial adoptions involve white parents and black children. TheGrio reports on one Georgia family who has confronted stereotypes and myths around race and adoption.


Mary Riley knows what some people have to say when they see her and her boys. But, the 68-year-old Georgia resident says simply: “I pay no mind to that.”

The stares, the occasional negative comments and the questions are a fact of life, she acknowledges, for as long as she raises them.

Riley, 68, is black and her three sons — Austin, Dustyn and Justyn — are white.

Read more at: www.thegrio.com

October 24, 2011 | 1:00 PM | By

How to Save the Lincoln Theatre

The historic Lincoln Theatre, the “jewel of Black Broadway,” is running out of money and could close by year’s end. Should the D.C. government infuse more public money to save it, or not? The Washington City Paper‘s Ally Schweitzer rejects both approaches, writing that “public money alone can’t solve the problem. But new management and a strong public relations strategy could help.”


The Lincoln Theatre should not be propped up indefinitely, nor should it be abandoned. Lincoln has hosted strong programming recently, including two Arena Stage seasons, an NEA Jazz Masters concert, the go-go awards, and a two-day Indian arts festival. But promoters I spoke to said it desperately lacks a competitive edge.

Read more at: www.washingtoncitypaper.com

October 24, 2011 | 11:38 AM | By

Life for Interracial Couples in D.C.

Matt Radick / Flickr

Last week, we wrote about the rise of interracial marriage and asked how tolerant D.C. is of mixed-race couples. Many of you responded that you sometimes receive stares or negative comments, while others wrote their experiences have been mostly positive.

Admittedly, these stories can’t fully capture every experience, but they do provide some insights into what life is like for interracial couples in D.C. If you’d like to share your story, contribute by posting a comment below.

Luis writes that “the more interracial couples feel comfortable out in the world, the better chances we have of building a world defined by our common humanity rather than our race:”

When I mentioned this article to my wife, she asked if I was going to comment on it. “Wait, we’re interracial, right?” she had to double-check. We often forget. When it comes to our relationship I don’t really see race. We haven’t been in DC that long, but most places we’ve been, we are pretty comfortable in public…

Continue reading →

FILED UNDER: Around the City, Interracial dating, Race
October 24, 2011 | 8:11 AM | By

“Behind the Name: Adams Morgan”

Adams Morgan was named after two 1950s schools: John Quincy Adams Elementary, for white students, and Thomas P. Morgan Elementary, for black students.

Adams Morgan is a study in contradiction. It is named for two once-segregated schools, yet it is remembered for the biracial cooperation of their principals and others to improve the community. It prides itself on being the polar opposite of the homogeneous cookie-cutter suburbs, yet it itself was once a suburb. It rightfully decries and fears gentrification as being right around the corner, though it has been doing so for nearly five decades, and despite the fact that before the neighborhood was rich it was poor, but before it was poor, it was originally rich.

— dcist.com

October 21, 2011 | 9:00 AM | By

Is Gentrification Always Bad?

Gentrification is not only good for communities, but necessary for cities to thrive, Kaid Benfield argues in a post on The Atlantic Cities. But, as he cautions, steps need to be taken to ensure income diversity. “The challenge” with gentrification, Benfield writes, “is to have enough without having too much.”


Fashioning the more equitable, prosperous, and sustainable cities of the future will require more, not less, revitalization and more, not fewer, new residents. But it will also require providing high-quality affordable housing in neighborhoods where revitalization is occurring. It will require bringing existing residents to the table early and often in the planning process, but to help shape good neighborhood development, not to prevent it. And, where wounds over gentrification exist, we must take steps to heal them, because divisive rhetoric only hurts everyone involved and, ultimately, the viability of our communities.

— www.theatlanticcities.com

October 20, 2011 | 4:18 PM | By

DCentric Picks: ‘Trouble in Mind’ and Food Day

Richard Anderson / Courtesy of Arena Stage

Brandon J. Dirden as John Nevins, Thomas Jefferson Byrd as Sheldon Forrester, E. Faye Butler as Wiletta Mayer and Marty Lodge as Al Manners in "Trouble in Mind."

What: “Trouble in Mind,” a play about a 1955 racially integrated theater company that wants to present a race play.

Where: Arena Stage, 1101 6th St. SW.

When: The play runs through Sunday.

Cost: Prices vary depending on seats and showtimes. You can find ticket prices here.

Why you should go: The play-within-a-play, set more than 50 years ago, still has relevance today. The black characters are seen confronting racial stereotypes as they work to make it to Broadway. A black and white cast is shown producing a play about a young, southern black man who becomes the target of a lynch mob.

Other events to consider: Monday is Food Day, which seeks to promote healthy, affordable and sustainable food. D.C. is home to a number of events, including the Food Day Extravaganza on Woodrow Wilson Plaza. There will be chef demonstrations, entertainment, educational activities and, yes, free food. The event starts at 11 a.m.

FILED UNDER: Culture, Delightful City, Arena Stage, DCentric Picks, Food, Race
October 20, 2011 | 2:20 PM | By

Two Americas Coexist in D.C.

D.C. is a microcosm of national class disparities, and the country saw the gulf between the rich and poor widen during the recession. Theo Balcomb, production assistant for “All Things Considered,” writes about these “two Americas” she saw while helping produce stories on the economy.

While in Spartanburg, S.C., Balcomb met a diabetic pregnant woman on disability, “struggling to sort through cereal and pork patties in her food pantry box.” Balcolm witnessed the other America when reporting from New York’s Upper East Side, where, while visiting a seven-story mansion, her “biggest concern was not getting winded as I carried a bottle of wine, a corkscrew and a cheese plate up to the roof.”

And that’s what’s confusing: That America is a place where these two worlds can coexist, often without knowledge of each other. One where a pregnant woman has to wait in line for frozen pork patties, and one where I’m in New York being offered goat cheese and fig spread and crisp gluten-free crackers and low-fat string cheese.

The contrast has always been there, but it’s looking stark right about now. The 27-year-old woman working in the grocery store lit up when she had this thought: Those people in Washington, those people with all the money who make all the decisions, they should have to live a week in our shoes. It could be a new reality show, she said brightly. Just a week. Just a week in our shoes.

Victor Cheung / Flickr

The U.S. Capitol isn't far from some of D.C.'s poorest neighborhoods.

Many around the country view D.C. as the power capital of the world, but the District’s disparities are some of the starkest. The D.C. region has the highest incomes and lowest poverty rates in the nation. But 1 in 5 people in the District proper live below the poverty line. In Ward 3, 49 percent of people have incomes higher than $100,000 annually and unemployment is about 3 percent. A few miles away in Ward 8, 41.1 percent of people have incomes below $25,000 and unemployment is at about 25 percent.

Those “people in Washington… with all the money who make all the decisions” are presumably politicians and lobbyists on Capitol Hill. They don’t need to travel to South Carolina to see poverty or hardship. They can drive 10 minutes away to see it.

FILED UNDER: Media, Class, Income disparity, Poverty
October 20, 2011 | 12:14 PM | By

Should D.C. Save Lincoln Theatre?

There are plenty of voices calling for the city to prevent the closure of U Street’s Lincoln Theatre, the “jewel of Black Broadway.” Here’s one that isn’t. Eli Lehrer writes that the revitalization of U Street, which included the Lincoln Theatre restoration, hurt the area’s ability to remain a cultural destination. U Street “may have more jazz history per square inch than any other similar stretch in the world,” Lehrer writes, but now only two jazz clubs remain.


The Lincoln, white elephant that it is, doesn’t help and may even hurt the ability of the area to emerge as a stronger arts destination. It’s empty almost all the time and converting it for something more useful would likely reduce rents (slightly) elsewhere in the area. Restrictive D.C. laws that limit the places music clubs (even if they only offer acoustic music) can operate combined with high rents — driven higher by both governmental and private investment along U Street — have driven out more jazz clubs and stopped new ones from coming in. High D.C. property and income taxes make it inefficient to rent out any space that will be used only three or four nights a week (as most jazz clubs are). And this means that suburban hotels host more local jazz talent than D.C. jazz clubs.

— www.huffingtonpost.com

October 20, 2011 | 9:52 AM | By

Can Moving to a Middle Class Neighborhood Make You Healthier?

Adrian Clark / Flickr

It’s well documented that poverty and bad health have a strong connection. A team of researchers wondered if simply moving from a low income to middle class neighborhood could make a person healthier.

Turns out that it does, according to a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine does. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development researchers studied three groups. One group stayed in poor neighborhoods. Another group received rent subsidies to move into middle class neighborhoods. The third group received the same subsidies to help with rent, but remained in poor neighborhoods. The results: the group who moved to the middle class neighborhood were 5 percent less likely to be obese and show signs of diabetes. The people who stayed in the poor neighborhoods, even with the help of extra money, experienced no improvement in health.

From ScienceNOW:

The experiment clearly shows that the neighborhood effect is real, says Nicholas Christakis, a sociologist at Harvard Medical School in Boston who studies the effect of social ties on health, but the mechanisms remain murky. Is it the shops and restaurants, the parks and pools, he wonders, “or the people in a neighborhood that affect you most?” For example, Christakis says, the people who moved might have lost weight because safer streets and open spaces “allowed them to walk outside more, or because they saw thinner people around them, or both.”

Even if a neighborhood has plenty of recreational facilities and opportunities, it doesn’t mean people will take advantage of them. Research shows the fear of violence discourages people from being active outside. People are less likely to walk, bike or let their kids play outside. That rings true in D.C., where Ward 8, the ward with the most violent crime thus far this year, also has the lowest physical activity rate. We may have plenty of food deserts, but we also have our fair share of exercise deserts.

FILED UNDER: Class, Food Deserts, Health disparities