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The Guardian •

Gary Younge on being pigeonholed as a black journalist

“We have people who can write about this,” the journalist Gary Younge remembers an editor once telling him about a column he had written on Bosnia. “Can you add an ethnic sensibility to this?”For Younge, being one of the few black columnists in the British press has not been easy; rather, it has been a constant struggle, he explains, to avoid being pigeonholed as a journalist only ever interested in race.
The Guardian •

The heroic Guardian reporter who documented the rise of the Nazis

Frederick Augustus Voigt was the Manchester Guardian’s Berlin correspondent between 1920 and 1932.In this episode, two fellow former Berlin correspondents, Helen Pidd and Philip Oltermann, discuss Voigt’s incredible reporting on the rise of Nazi Germany.“I think he saw that it was important not to give the Nazis the ‘both sides’ treatment,” Philip says. “And was really razor sharp when it came to focusing on the political violence that the Nazis were inflicting...
The Guardian •

Uncovering Black British history beyond London

When Guardian arts and culture correspondent Lanre Bakare was growing up, he learned the same Black British history as many of us did. It was a series of singular events: the docking of the Windrush in 1948, unrest in Notting Hill or Brixton, the murder of Stephen Lawrence. All important, but all firmly focused on the capital.Now Lanre has written a book about the Thatcher years, looking at the stories that are less often told: those that took place outside London.
The Guardian •

Ta-Nehisi Coates on why stories matter in the age of Trump

“This is a cultural president. Make no mistake about it.”For Ta-Nehisi Coates, the award-winning writer and journalist, the US president, Donald Trump, and his allies clearly understand the power of story-telling in politics. Coates has recently written a new book, The Message, and he tells Michael Safi that the stories told in TV, films, literature and beyond are not a distraction from politics today but are actively shaping it.
The Guardian •

Exposed: listening in on a $35m phone scam

“I’d quite like to just try and get a deposit together, to buy a house and stuff.”After Mark* saw an advert for a financial trading website, he signed up to what he believed was access to an adviser who called herself Lilliana.Through long phone calls together, Mark believed that he was making investments and that they were generating lucrative returns.But when he tried to access his earnings, he found himself on a slippery slope that ended with him losing all of his life savings.
The Guardian •

Undercover inside a ‘scientific racism’ network

Harry Shukman is a journalist and an activist with the anti-racist organisation Hope Not Hate. About a year ago, under the name Chris, he set out to infiltrate a group of far-right street activists. Following a lead he picked up at a far-right event in Estonia, his investigation led him down a different path. Instead of street thugs, he found himself in meetings with a network of people who considered themselves intellectuals, people dabbling in what they called “human biodiversity”.
The Guardian •

The making of Kamala Harris

In Chicago this week Democrats will officially welcome Kamala Harris as their presidential nominee. Just a few months ago this was, for many people, an unlikely if not unthinkable scenario. Harris was a lacklustre vice-president, the narrative went, and her previous bid to be a presidential candidate had not gone well.Today things could not be more different. Celebrities are falling over themselves to endorse her, and there is genuine excitement over her entry into the race.
The Guardian •

The mother who forgave her daughters’ killer – but not the police

Mina Smallman’s life has not been an easy one but she could always find hope somewhere. The first female archdeacon from an ethnic minority background she was brought up, she says, in “poverty and chaos”. But as a young single parent she went back to school and became a teacher, looking for sparks of potential in even the most unpromising children.She met her husband Chris, and had a wonderfully happy family life with her three daughters until one day when everything changed.
The Guardian •

Returning to Leigh: can Labour rebuild the red wall?

Leigh in Greater Manchester used to be a Labour party stronghold. A former mining and mill town, it was once Andy Burnham’s constituency. But in 2019 that was swept away as the town voted for Boris Johnson.Helen Pidd, then the Guardian’s northern editor, visited it often – and in 2020 people there told her why Labour had lost its shine for them. Four years later, with Labour cautiously hopeful it can regain the town, she returned to find out what has changed.
The Guardian •

Overcrowded and understaffed: life in England’s crumbling prisons

When the 21-year-old terror suspect Daniel Khalife managed to escape from Wandsworth prison earlier this month, apparently on the underside of a van, it turned the spotlight on to what was really going on in England’s jails. The Guardian’s north of England editor, Helen Pidd, has been investigating the state of prisons and tells Nosheen Iqbal she found in some cases a system close to breaking point. There’s chronic overcrowding, appalling conditions and a decimated workforce. Among it all are s
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