Hall Pass: The Podcast Hall Pass

Black Women in the U.S. are three to four times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related death than white women. Black babies have an infant mortality rate that is double that of white babies. On this episode, Jamal speaks with Jamarah Amani, Director of Southern Birth Justice Network and midwife herself, and Keisha Goode of the National Association of Certified Professional Midwives about the Black experiences in midwifery.

It's true. Slaves built the White House and they built the Capitol too. On this episode, Jamal sits down with Howard University professor & author Dr. Clarence Lusane to discuss the most historic landmarks built off the backs of slaves.

Aunt Shirley’s mac and cheese. Uncle Leroy’s crispy fried chicken. Grandma Ethel’s Sunday dinner. How did we universally choose not to eat everybody's potato salad? The Soul Food Scholar Adrian Miller enters into the hallway to break down the real Black history of soul food.

Tulsa, Wilmington, and Rosewood. Just a few of the historically black towns thriving before white supremacy destroyed them. After violence, unfair local government, economic divestment, or just pure tomfoolery, these cities no longer exist. Jamal takes a look back with co-directors of the Chicago Race Riot of 1919 Commemoration Project and Soul City's former planning chief.

Before one of the most critical elections in our nation's history, we're forced to reckon with a deep past. Kamala Harris said it best, "We don't know their stories but we stand on their shoulders," referring to the Black women who helped secure the right to vote but were still prohibited from voting, long after its ratification. Jamal sits down with author Evette Dionne to reflect on the 19th Amendment's centennial anniversary and the past, present & future of Black women in the suffrage movement.

Jamal will debunk the false narrative that Black women only just began to write provocative songs expressing their sexual identities. Complex culture writer Brianna Holt and Baltimore creative writer Brianna Holt have the Hall Pass on this week's episode.