The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy

Episode

• 
  Reggae: The Golden Age of a Spiritual Revolution and Musical Rebellion, 1970-1980 01.10.2026 57mnt

  In "Reggae: The Golden Age of a Spiritual Revolution and Musical Rebellion, 1970–1980," Dr. Reiland Rabaka enters the decade when Jamaica transformed bass, drum, scripture, street knowledge, and Rastafari consciousness into a global language of liberation. Moving from the Wailers' Soul Rebels to Bob Marley and the Wailers' Uprising, the episode explores how roots reggae challenged colonial power, racial hierarchy, economic inequality, political violence, and the unfinished promises of Jamaican independence. What does freedom sound like when a nation has gained a flag, but its people are still fighting for dignity? How can music awaken historical memory, nourish Black consciousness, defend tenderness, and move listeners from spiritual reflection toward democratic action? Through the music of Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Bunny Wailer, Burning Spear, Culture, the Mighty Diamonds, the Congos, Marcia Griffiths, Judy Mowatt, Althea and Donna, Janet Kay, and other essential voices, the episode hears reggae as the people's newspaper, portable sanctuary, and Pan-African protest. Interludes from the original poem "Wake the Town and Tell the People" weave Nyabinghi drumming, dub poetry cadence, and Rastafari mysticism through the story. A chronological 36-song companion playlist, featuring ten classic recordings by women reggae artists, extends the journey from Jamaica into Britain, Africa, rap, and the twenty-first century. Turn the music up, wake the town, and hear why reggae's struggle for spiritual freedom, social justice, and radical democracy still moves the world. See all show notes and the Reggae playlist on our website https://www.colorado.edu/center/caaas/podcast/episodes/episode-44-reggae-golden-age-spiritual-revolution-and-musical-rebellion-1970-1980
• 
  The Freedom Songs of the Civil Rights Movement 17.09.2026 58mnt

  What happens when a movement for freedom finds its voice—and a people turn song into courage? In this episode of The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores the freedom songs of the Civil Rights Movement as far more than a soundtrack to struggle. Rooted in African American spirituals, gospel traditions, Black sacred practices, labor organizing, and generations of communal music-making, freedom songs transformed churches, mass meetings, marches, buses, streets, and jail cells into spaces of resistance and possibility. The episode journeys through Montgomery, Nashville, Albany, Mississippi, and Selma while examining how singing helped movement members confront segregation, racial violence, fear, grief, and the unfinished promises of American democracy. At its center is a profound question: What happens when people denied full democratic voice begin singing freedom together? The original poem "What We Sang Before Freedom Came" explores song as memory, medicine, community, courage, and collective Black testimony. A 25-song thematic playlist carries listeners deeper into the movement through Fannie Lou Hamer, Bernice Johnson Reagon, the SNCC Freedom Singers, mass-meeting congregations, and Freedom Marchers whose voices made history audible. These songs did not simply describe freedom. They helped people practice it. Tune in—and hear what happened when democracy learned to sing. See all show notes and the Freedom Songs playlist on our website https://www.colorado.edu/center/caaas/podcast/episodes/episode-43-freedom-songs-civil-rights-movement
• 
  The Civil Rights Movement 03.09.2026 59mnt

  "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." — Martin Luther King Jr., "Letter from Birmingham City Jail," 1963" What happens when a nation declares freedom but keeps a Colored Section waiting inside democracy?   In this episode of The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy, Dr. Reiland Rabaka journeys through the Civil Rights Movement and the longer Black freedom struggle that made it possible. Moving from Abolition, Reconstruction, anti-lynching activism, Black labor organizing, and the struggle against Jim Crow through Montgomery, Birmingham, Mississippi, Selma, and the great legislative victories of 1964 and 1965, the episode asks what freedom means when Black people must risk their lives to exercise rights democracy claims already belong to them.   The episode centers movement makers including Martin Luther King Jr., Ella Baker, Rosa Parks, Fannie Lou Hamer, Septima Clark, Diane Nash, Medgar Evers, and John Lewis while confronting the violence directed against people practicing nonviolent resistance. The original poem "The Colored Section" transforms segregation's infamous sign into a metaphor for the distance between emancipation and the need for radical democratization. A companion playlist travels from Mahalia Jackson, Muddy Waters, Max Roach and Bob Dylan through Odetta, John Coltrane, Nina Simone, Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, and Sly Stone, before a coda featuring Edwin Starr and Marvin Gaye carries the struggle forward.   The signs came down. But did the Colored Section disappear?   Tune in—and listen to democracy answer.   See all show notes and The Civil Rights Playlist on our website   URL: https://www.colorado.edu/center/caaas/podcast/episodes/episode-42-civil-rights-movement
• 
  The Music of the African Diaspora: Reggae, Salsa, Samba, Calypso & Soca, and Cumbia 18.08.2026 53mnt

  What happens when memory learns to move through rhythm? In this episode of The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy, Dr. Reiland Rabaka journeys across Jamaica, Cuba, Puerto Rico, New York, Brazil, Trinidad & Tobago, and Colombia to explore five great musical traditions of the African diaspora: reggae, salsa, samba, calypso & soca, and cumbia. Moving from enslavement and racial colonialism through migration, urbanization, Carnival, Rastafari, Pan-Africanism, popular protest, and cultural globalization, the episode asks how Black communities transformed historical struggle into extraordinary musical creativity. From reggae's bass-heavy meditations on Babylon and liberation to salsa's diasporic conversations, samba's communion of rhythm and movement, calypso's sharp social commentary, soca's Carnival release, and cumbia's cultural crossings, these musics reveal sound as archive, sanctuary, protest, pleasure, and democratic expression. Read the full show notes and see the Music of the African Diaspora playlist http://bit.ly/thecausepodcast
• 
  Ep 40: African Diaspora: Beyond Borders, Beyond Boundaries 06.08.2026 55mnt

  "History is not the past. It is the present. We carry our history with us. We are our history." — James Baldwin, I Am Not Your Negro The African Diaspora is not simply the history of Africans dispersed across the globe. It is the story of a civilization whose influence crossed oceans, whose ideas crossed generations, and whose enduring commitment to freedom continues to enlarge the democratic imagination of humanity. In this episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka traces the Diaspora from its ancient roots in Africa's great kingdoms, empires, and trading networks, through the catastrophe of the transatlantic slave trade and the horrors of the Middle Passage, through the rise of Pan-Africanism and the global struggle for decolonization, and into the living, worldwide community of African-descended people that continues shaping the 21st century. Too often, the African Diaspora is reduced to the story of slavery alone. Dr. Rabaka insists on a richer and more honest telling: the people who crossed the Atlantic Ocean did not arrive empty-handed. They carried agricultural knowledge, traditions of metalworking and craftsmanship, sophisticated systems of spirituality and community organization, and ethical visions that transformed mutual responsibility even when every institution around them denied their humanity. Empires transported bodies. African people carried civilizations. Dr. Rabaka examines the intellectual and political traditions that grew from this shared historical experience, honoring the visionary thinkers who helped connect the struggles of African-descended people across the globe. W.E.B. Du Bois understood that the struggles of African Americans could never be separated from colonial rule in Africa or racial oppression across the Caribbean and Latin America. Marcus Garvey inspired millions toward pride, economic independence, and global solidarity. Anna Julia Cooper argued that the advancement of Black women strengthened democracy itself. Ella Baker reminded us that strong people don't need strong leaders because strong people lead themselves. And the Haitian Revolution demonstrated that liberty was not the exclusive language of Europe or North America. It belonged to humanity. Together, these lives and movements form the foundation of Pan-Africanism, one of the most influential political and intellectual traditions of the modern era. See the full show notes, listen to the playlist and explore our list of further reading recommendations
• 
  Ep 39: The Blues: Musical Memories, Oral Histories, and Cultural Archives 16.07.2026 59mnt

  The blues is not simply a music of sadness, heartbreak, or loss. Those themes are present, but they do not define the tradition. The blues is one of history's most eloquent narrators, philosophy carried in song, theology expressed through everyday life, and democratic testimony voiced by ordinary women and men whose names rarely appear in history books but whose lives helped shape the modern world. In this episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka traces the blues from its deepest roots in the musical cultures of West and Central Africa, through the field hollers and work songs of enslavement, through its mature emergence in the Mississippi Delta, and into the Great Migration that carried it north to Chicago and beyond. The blues was born from contradiction, emerging from a nation that proclaimed liberty while protecting slavery, celebrated democracy while denying citizenship, and promised opportunity while constructing systems of racial domination. Black communities responded not only through protest and political organizing, but through culture. They sang before they could vote. They created before they were recognized as creators. They imagined freedom long before law acknowledged their humanity. Dr. Rabaka examines how the blues inherited the call and response, rhythmic vitality, and improvisational freedom of African musical traditions, and how it carried the emotional intensity and sacred aspiration of the spirituals into the ordinary struggles of daily life. He explores the world that produced the blues, the sharecropping, the Jim Crow laws, the racial violence and unfinished freedom of the post-Reconstruction South, and honors the artists who gave it voice: Charlie Patton, Son House, Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters, Howlin Wolf, Little Walter, and the extraordinary Black women who transformed American popular culture, Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, Ida Cox, Memphis Minnie, and Victoria Spivey, who insisted that Black women's experiences belonged at the center of public life. See all show notes and The Blues curated playlist
• 
  Ep 38: The Spirituals: The Black Sacred Song Tradition 02.07.2026 1j 2mnt

  "The Black folk song, the rhythmic cry of the slave, stands today not simply as the sole American music, but as the most beautiful expression of human experience born this side the seas."  - W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk What can a song teach us about freedom? What can a melody reveal about memory, resilience, and the long struggle for human dignity? In this episode of The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores the spirituals, the foundational African American musical tradition that emerged from the crucible of enslavement and became one of the most powerful expressions of Black faith, creativity, cultural memory, and democratic aspiration. Tracing the spirituals from their African and African diasporic roots through the era of slavery and beyond, this episode examines how these sacred songs functioned as prayer, protest, philosophy, historical testimony, communal healing, and visions of liberation. Along the way, listeners will encounter the social, political, religious, and cultural worlds that shaped the spirituals and discover how they influenced gospel, blues, jazz, soul, funk, rap, and the broader history of Black music. The episode also features the original poem, "The Sacred Singers Remain With Us," a meditation on memory, music, and the enduring presence of those whose voices carried hope through history. Accompanying the episode is a thematic playlist that journeys from classic spirituals to later musical traditions shaped by their legacy, revealing the deep currents connecting sacred song, freedom dreams, and cultural transformation. More than a story about music, this is a story about democracy, justice, community, and the human capacity to create beauty during strife and struggle. Tune in and discover why the spirituals still sing, and why their voices continue to call us toward freedom. Learn More and Explore Spirituals, Wikipedia News and Articles Black Spirituals as Poetry and Resistance, The New York Times The Bible in Song: Reclaiming African American Spirituals, Reflections, Yale University Born from tragedy, the power of collective Black singing continues to stay relevant, CBS News Further Reading & Listening William Francis Allen, Charles Pickard Ware, and Lucy McKim Garrison, eds., Slave Songs of the United States (New York: A. Simpson & Co., 1867). James H. Cone, The Spirituals and the Blues: An Interpretation (New York: Seabury Press, 1972). Dena J. Epstein, Sinful Tunes and Spirituals: Black Folk Music to the Civil War (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1977). Arthur C. Jones, Wade in the Water: The Wisdom of the Spirituals (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1993). John Lovell Jr., Black Song: The Forge and the Flame: The Story of How the Afro-American Spiritual Was Hammered Out (New York: Macmillan, 1972). Bernice Johnson Reagon, If You Don't Go, Don't Hinder Me: The African American Sacred Song Tradition (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001). Bernice Johnson Reagon, ed., We'll Understand It Better By and By: Pioneering African American Gospel Composers (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992). Jon Michael Spencer, Protest and Praise: Sacred Music of Black Religion (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1990). Various Artists, Wade in the Water: African American Sacred Music Traditions, Vols. 1–4, compiled by Bernice Johnson Reagon (Smithsonian Folkways Recordings SF 40076, 4 CDs, 1996). Playlist The Spirituals: The Black Sacred Song Tradition Playlist Listen to The Spirituals playlis on Spotify Preface by Dr. Reiland Rabaka The spirituals are among the deepest roots of African American music and among the most profound artistic traditions in human history. Emerging from the crucible of slavery, they carried memory when memory was threatened, dignity when dignity was denied, and visions of freedom when freedom seemed distant. They were prayers and protests, testimonies and theories, sacred songs and democratic dreams. Through them, enslaved African Americans transformed suffering into beauty, isolation into community, and faith into collective action. This playlist traces a musical journey across a century of recorded sound, beginning with classic spirituals preserved by African American singers and institutions that recognized their enduring value. From there, it follows the spiritual tradition into gospel, the Civil Rights Movement freedom songs, soul, reggae, and contemporary Black music. Along the way, listeners can hear recurring themes: deliverance, perseverance, communal solidarity, moral courage, and the conviction that another world is possible. The spirituals did not disappear after emancipation. They evolved. Their echoes can be heard in church sanctuaries, freedom marches, concert halls, jazz clubs, reggae sound systems, and rap music recordings. This playlist reveals the deep currents connecting sacred song, freedom dreams, cultural memory, and democratic possibility across generations. The voices change, the instruments change, the historical circumstances change, but the spirit song continues its journey. Listen to the saga of the Black sacred song. The Spirituals Playlist by Dr. Reiland Rabaka Deep River, Marian Anderson (1924) One of the earliest celebrated recordings of a spiritual, "Deep River" embodies longing, transcendence, and the symbolic journey toward freedom. The river serves simultaneously as a religious symbol and a metaphor for liberation. Go Down Moses, Paul Robeson (1925) Robeson's majestic interpretation of this spiritual foregrounds the Exodus story that became central to Black freedom struggles. Moses and Pharaoh became enduring symbols of liberation and oppression. Steal Away, Roland Hayes (1927) A spiritual of quiet yearning and sacred anticipation, "Steal Away" reflects both spiritual devotion and the desire for deliverance from earthly bondage. Didn't It Rain? Mahalia Jackson (1954) Jackson connects the spiritual tradition directly to modern gospel music. Her performance demonstrates how the sacred musical vocabulary of slavery continued to evolve in the twentieth century. Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child, Odetta (1956) Odetta's haunting interpretation captures the emotional depth of separation, displacement, and longing that shaped the experiences of enslaved Africans and their descendants. Hold 'Em Joe, Harry Belafonte (1957) Drawing from Afro-Caribbean traditions, Belafonte reminds listeners that the story of slavery and resistance belongs to the broader African diaspora, not solely the United States. Joshua Fit the Battle of Jericho, Mahalia Jackson (1958) The biblical narrative of walls falling becomes a powerful symbol of collective struggle and transformation. The song foreshadows later freedom movements that sought to dismantle segregation and racial injustice. Packin' Up, Marion Williams (1962) One of the great voices in Black sacred music, Marion Williams brought extraordinary emotional depth and vocal innovation to gospel performance. "Packin' Up" draws directly from the spiritual tradition's themes of pilgrimage, deliverance, and preparation for liberation, whether understood spiritually, existentially or socially. This May Be the Last Time, The Staple Singers (1962) Rooted in the spiritual tradition, this recording bridges sacred music and social consciousness. Its message of urgency and moral accountability resonated deeply during the Civil Rights Movement. We Shall Not Be Moved, The Freedom Singers (1963) One of the great freedom songs of the Civil Rights Movement, it demonstrates how activists adapted older spiritual traditions into collective songs of protest and democratic participation. We Shall Overcome, The Freedom Singers (1963) Perhaps the most famous freedom song of the twentieth century, it emerged from the same communal, participatory ethos that animated the spirituals. The sorrow songs became freedom songs. Peace Be Still, James Cleveland (1963) Often called the "King of Gospel," James Cleveland represents a direct descendant of the spiritual tradition. "Peace Be Still" transforms biblical faith into communal reassurance, demonstrating how the spirituals' emphasis on endurance, healing, and divine presence continued through modern gospel music and the Black church. Mississippi Goddam, Nina Simone (1964) Simone channels the prophetic spirit of the spiritual tradition into direct political critique. The sacred impulse toward justice becomes a demand for immediate social change. I've Got a Feeling, Shirley Caesar (1966) Caesar's performance exemplifies the spiritual tradition's transformation into modern gospel. The song combines testimony, communal affirmation, and unwavering faith, carrying forward the spirituals' emphasis on perseverance, hope, and divine accompaniment through struggle. Amazing Grace, Aretha Franklin (1972) Recorded live at New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles, Franklin's landmark interpretation transforms a classic hymn through the musical language of the Black sacred song tradition. The performance demonstrates how the emotional intensity, communal spirit, improvisational freedom, and redemptive vision of the spirituals continued to flourish in modern gospel music. Precious Lord, Take My Hand, Aretha Franklin (1972) A gospel classic deeply indebted to the spiritual tradition, Franklin's performance reminds listeners that sacred music remained central to African American cultural and political life long after slavery. Natural Mystic, Bob Marley (1977) Marley's meditation on history, suffering, spirituality, and collective destiny echoes the prophetic dimensions of the spirituals. Like the sorrow songs, "Natural Mystic" suggests that beneath visible events lie deeper moral and spiritual currents shaping human history. Jah Guide, Peter Tosh (1977) Tosh's prayer for divine guidance extends the spiritual tradition into the Rastafari Movement and the wider African diaspora. Like the spirituals, the song treats faith as a source of strength, moral direction, endurance, and liberation in a world marked by oppression and injustice. Wade in the Water, Sweet Honey in the Rock (1988) This celebrated a cappella interpretation returns directly to one of the most beloved spirituals. Their arrangement highlights the communal vocal traditions at the heart of Black sacred music. Eyes on the Prize, Mavis Staples (1993) A Civil Rights Movement anthem rooted in the spiritual tradition, this song underscores the continuity between slavery, segregation, and the ongoing struggle for justice. Free at Last, Blind Boys of Alabama (2001) The title itself evokes both the spiritual tradition and Martin Luther King's prophetic vision. The performance celebrates liberation while acknowledging the long journey toward it. Looking for You, Kirk Franklin (2005) Franklin demonstrates how contemporary gospel continues to draw from the emotional, communal, and spiritual foundations established by the spirituals. Sing About Me, I'm Dying of Thirst, Kendrick Lamar (2012) Lamar's meditation on mortality, memory, violence, repentance, and spiritual renewal echoes themes that have animated Black sacred music for generations. The song functions as a contemporary testimony, connecting the spiritual tradition's concern with salvation, suffering, and redemption to the realities of twenty-first-century urban life. At the Purchaser's Option, Rhiannon Giddens (2017) Drawing from historical documents related to slavery, Giddens reconnects contemporary audiences with the lives and struggles that gave rise to the spiritual tradition. Freedom, Jon Batiste (2021) Batiste's exuberant celebration of joy, dignity, and liberation serves as a contemporary reminder that the freedom dreams embedded in the spirituals continue to inspire new generations.
• 
  Ep 37: Juneteenth: Freedom Deferred, Freedom Declared, Freedom Demanded 18.06.2026 53mnt

  "If there is no struggle, there is no progress." — Frederick Douglass Juneteenth is not merely a holiday. It is not merely a date on a calendar, a festival, a parade, or a cookout. Juneteenth is a historical mirror. It asks us to look honestly at America's promises and America's contradictions, to remember both the wounds and the wonders of the American experiment. In this special episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka traces the origins of Juneteenth, from June 19, 1865, when Union Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas to announce what enslaved people in Texas had been denied for more than two years, to the decades of organizing by activists, educators, churches, and communities that finally secured federal recognition in 2021. At the center of it all is one of democracy's enduring lessons: freedom must not only be announced. It must be enforced. It must be protected. It must be practiced. Dr. Rabaka situates Juneteenth within the broader sweep of African American democratic history, pushing back against narratives that reduce the era of slavery to suffering alone. Enslaved and freed African Americans were not passive recipients of freedom. They were active architects of a more democratic society, challenging slavery through rebellion, cultural preservation, religious innovation, and everyday acts of resistance. During Reconstruction, Black men voted, Black leaders held public office, Black communities built schools and newspapers and mutual aid societies, and Black citizens participated in the most significant democratic experiment in American history. Their contributions, Dr. Rabaka insists, belong not only to Black history. They belong to American history. They belong to the history of democracy itself. No discussion of Juneteenth is complete without Frederick Douglass, and Dr. Rabaka gives his 1852 masterpiece, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?, the close reading it deserves. Douglass did not reject American ideals. He challenged Americans to honor them. He did not condemn liberty. He exposed hypocrisy. The speech functions like a mirror, forcing the nation to see the gap between its national rhetoric and its social reality, and it remains, Dr. Rabaka argues, one of the most profound and relevant democratic documents ever written. Alongside Douglass, the episode honors Opal Lee, the educator and activist known as the grandmother of Juneteenth, whose decades of tireless organizing remind us that ordinary people change history. The episode closes with Dr. Rabaka's original tone poem, "The News Came Late" — a multi-voiced mosaic drawn from ancestral wisdom, composed as a homage to the people who endured the Middle Passage, survived 250 years of enslavement, and still kept faith with the future. It is a poem about hands planting and hands praying, about hope hiding inside mothers teaching children the names of stars, about a flame passed carefully from generation to generation. A specially curated Juneteenth commemoration playlist accompanies this episode. LEARN MORE AND EXPLORE Wikipedia: Juneteenth Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture: Juneteenth  Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History: Juneteenth  PBS NewsHour Classroom: History of Juneteenth and Why It Became a National Holiday  Britannica: Juneteenth News and Articles Is Juneteenth Still a Federal Holiday? What Trump Changed (USA Today / Yahoo News, June 2026) Freedom Summer 2026: Activists Launch Juneteenth Surge (The Root, May 2026)  Juneteenth in Fort Worth: Inside the City's Black-Owned Spaces Building on Freedom (Essence, June 2026) Top Juneteenth Festivals and Events Across the U.S. in 2026 (EBONY, June 2026) Juneteenth Playlist Intro by Dr. Reiland Rabaka Juneteenth is not only a historical commemoration; it is also a musical archive. Long before freedom was legally recognized, it was imagined, sung, prayed, whispered, shouted, and remembered in song. Across the centuries, African American music has served as a living record of struggle and survival, preserving histories that official narratives often ignored or distorted. Spirituals carried coded messages of hope and liberation. The blues transformed sorrow into testimony. Jazz improvised new possibilities for freedom. Gospel joined personal faith to collective struggle. Soul and funk voiced demands for dignity and self-determination. Reggae internationalized the language of liberation, while rap chronicled the unfinished journey toward justice and democracy. This playlist traces a long freedom tradition from enslavement and emancipation through Reconstruction, Jim Crow segregation, the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements, and contemporary struggles for racial justice. Together, these songs remind us that music is more than entertainment. It is memory. It is protest. It is prophecy. It is a democratic practice through which ordinary people narrate their lives and imagine more just futures. These selections illuminate the enduring significance of Juneteenth by revealing how artists across generations transformed suffering into creativity, resistance into rhythm, and hope into collective action. They invite us to hear freedom not as a destination already reached, but as an ongoing journey carried forward in song. Listen to the Juneteenth playlist on Spotify Go Down, Moses, Traditional Spiritual One of the most powerful spirituals to emerge from the era of enslavement, this song links the biblical Exodus story to Black aspirations for liberation. Enslaved Africans transformed sacred narrative into a coded language of resistance, making freedom both a spiritual promise and a political dream. Swing Low, Sweet Chariot, Traditional Spiritual This beloved spiritual expresses both sorrow and hope, reflecting the emotional complexity of life under slavery. Its imagery of movement and deliverance resonates deeply with the long struggle that Juneteenth commemorates. Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child, Traditional Spiritual A haunting meditation on separation, displacement, and longing, the song reflects the devastating family disruptions produced by slavery. It reminds listeners that emancipation was also about restoring humanity, kinship, and belonging. Lift Every Voice and Sing, James Weldon Johnson and J. Rosamond Johnson (1900) Often called the Black National Anthem, this enduring hymn links emancipation to citizenship, perseverance, faith, and democratic aspiration. Its themes of remembrance and hope make it one of the most important musical expressions of African American historical memory. Strange Fruit, Billie Holiday (1939) This landmark recording confronts the racial terror that followed Reconstruction. By exposing the brutality of lynching, Holiday reminds us that emancipation did not immediately secure justice, equality, or safety for African Americans. Come Sunday, Duke Ellington (1943) Part of Ellington's monumental Black, Brown and Beige suite, this composition honors African American spiritual traditions and their role in sustaining dignity, faith, and cultural survival through centuries of oppression and resistance. Move On Up a Little Higher, Mahalia Jackson (1947) A gospel masterpiece rooted in the Black sacred tradition, Jackson's recording captures the spiritual determination that sustained generations from slavery through the modern freedom struggle. It expresses both earthly perseverance and transcendent hope. Oh, Freedom, Odetta (1956) Rooted in the experiences of formerly enslaved African Americans after emancipation, this freedom song bridges Juneteenth and the Civil Rights Movement. Odetta's powerful interpretation preserves the moral courage and democratic aspirations of those who struggled to transform freedom declared into freedom lived. A Change Is Gonna Come, Sam Cooke (1964) One of the defining freedom songs of modern America, Cooke's masterpiece captures both suffering and hope. Its emotional depth echoes the aspirations of generations who struggled to transform emancipation into full citizenship and democratic inclusion. Mississippi Goddam, Nina Simone (1964) Simone's searing protest song reminds listeners that legal freedom alone does not guarantee justice. Her music links the long history of Black resistance to the continuing demand for democratic transformation and human dignity. Freedom Highway, The Staple Singers (1965) Written during the Civil Rights Movement, this song connects nineteenth-century emancipation struggles to twentieth-century movements for voting rights and equality. It celebrates collective action, courage, and democratic participation. Say It Loud - I'm Black and I'm Proud, James Brown (1968) This anthem of Black self-determination and cultural affirmation reflects the legacy of emancipation in a later era. Brown's declaration of dignity, self-respect, and collective pride helped redefine freedom for a new generation. Freedom, Richie Havens (1969) Made famous through Havens's unforgettable Woodstock performance, this song transforms a spiritual refrain into a universal anthem of liberation. It stands at the crossroads of the Civil Rights Movement, the Black Power Movement, antiwar activism, and global freedom struggles. What's Going On?, Marvin Gaye (1971) Marvin Gaye expands the meaning of freedom beyond emancipation alone, addressing war, poverty, racial inequality, and social fragmentation. The song asks what democratic responsibility requires in a nation still struggling to fulfill its ideals. Living for the City, Stevie Wonder (1973) One of the most powerful musical narratives of post-Civil Rights Black America, Wonder's song traces the effects of structural racism, economic inequality, and urban hardship. It reminds listeners that emancipation was the beginning, not the end, of the struggle for justice. Redemption Song, Bob Marley and the Wailers (1980) Marley's meditation on liberation connects African diasporic struggles across national boundaries. The song underscores the global significance of freedom movements and the continuing work of emancipation throughout the African world. Fight the Power, Public Enemy (1989) A defining statement of rap political consciousness, this track challenges dominant narratives and demands historical accountability. It extends the democratic critiques voiced by Frederick Douglass into the late twentieth century. Keep Ya Head Up, Tupac Shakur (1993) This song broadens discussions of freedom by emphasizing dignity, resilience, care, and community responsibility. It reflects the continuing struggle to realize justice not only in institutions but also in everyday life. Glory, Common and John Legend (2014) Created for the film Selma, this song bridges historical and contemporary freedom movements. It demonstrates how the memory of emancipation and the Civil Rights Movement continues to inspire new generations of activists and artists. Alright, Kendrick Lamar (2015) Widely embraced as a contemporary anthem of resilience and hope, the song speaks to the persistence of racial inequality while affirming collective endurance. It echoes Juneteenth's central lesson that hope survives even amid hardship and struggle. Freedom, Beyoncé featuring Kendrick Lamar (2016) Drawing upon spiritual, blues, gospel, and contemporary Black musical traditions, this powerful anthem embodies the continuing quest for freedom, self-determination, and collective empowerment. It links historical memory to present-day movements for justice. Letter to the Free, Common (2016) Written for the documentary 13th, the song explores the relationship between slavery, incarceration, and contemporary systems of inequality. It encourages listeners to think critically about freedom's unfinished work in the twenty-first century. This Is America, Childish Gambino (2018) A provocative reflection on race, violence, spectacle, and national identity, this song challenges listeners to confront contradictions within American democracy. It underscores why historical memory remains essential to civic life and democratic renewal. Not Like Us, Kendrick Lamar (2024) More than a rap battle anthem, "Not Like Us" became a cultural event that sparked conversations about authenticity, accountability, community, and cultural ownership. Within the broader tradition of African American public critique, the song can be understood as a contemporary expression of self-definition and communal responsibility, themes that have long animated Black democratic thought.
• 
  Ep 36: Love is Love: LGBTQIA+ Liberation Movements and the Long Road to Democracy 04.06.2026 55mnt

  Love is love is not sentiment alone. It is a declaration, a demand, a democracy still unfinished. In this episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka traces the long and defiant arc of LGBTQIA+ liberation movements in America, from the hidden corners of pre-Stonewall queer life to the fury of the 1969 riots, through the grief and militancy of the AIDS crisis, and into today's ongoing battles over transgender rights, bodily autonomy, and human dignity. Throughout, this episode places special emphasis on Black LGBTQIA+ voices, voices too often marginalized even within movements for liberation, because when Black queer people fight for freedom, they expand the very meaning of freedom itself. Music accompanies this journey not merely as entertainment, but as archive and altar. Dr. Rabaka explores disco as one of the great democratic soundscapes of the 20th century, celebrates Sylvester and the prophetic power of house music, and honors the Black feminist intellectual tradition of Audre Lorde, Barbara Smith, and the Combahee River Collective. He restores the full complexity of Stonewall, centers Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, and traces the cultural explosions that followed, from ballroom houses and chosen families to the courage of ACT UP and the searing poetry of Essex Hemphill and Joseph Beam. From the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Obergefell v. Hodges to contemporary figures like Laverne Cox, Janet Mock, Janelle Monáe, and Lil Nas X, Dr. Rabaka asks the hard question: is representation enough? He affirms the transformative democratic tradition of Black queer feminism, reminds us that backlash is the predictable companion of democratic progress, and insists that once people begin imagining freedom differently, the old order can never fully restore itself. See all show notes and the "Love is Love" playlist on our website.
• 
  Ep 35: "Black Is Beautiful!": The Black Aesthetic and The Black Arts Movement, 1965-1975 21.05.2026 45mnt

  Black is beautiful is not a slogan alone, but a summons, a call to consciousness, a chorus of reclamation rising from a people long told to doubt their own reflection. In this episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores the Black Arts Movement, 1965 to 1975, a decade when art was insurgent and imagination was organized, when poetry marched and music mobilized, when theater testified and painting proclaimed. This was a time when culture did not trail politics. Culture led politics, setting the terms, shaping the language, sounding the future. The story of the Black Arts Movement does not begin in 1965. It begins earlier in the Harlem Renaissance, where Black artists first insisted that Black life was worthy of its own forms, languages, and light. By the 1960s, into the breach left by persistent inequality stepped the Black Power Movement, a call for self-determination, community control, and cultural pride. Alongside it rose the Black Arts Movement, the aesthetic arm of the Black Power Movement. If the Harlem Renaissance asked, "Who are we in modern America?" the Black Arts Movement answered, "We are what we make, and we will make it Black, bold, and beautiful." Dr. Rabaka examines the Black Aesthetic as a constellation of commitments that insisted Black art must emerge from Black experience, speak to Black communities, and serve Black liberation. It rejected the demand to conform to Eurocentric standards of beauty and embraced art for the people's necessity. The Black Aesthetic said: our rhythms are valid, our language is literature, our bodies are sites of knowledge, our communities are audiences and authors alike. It was both critique of a world that devalues Black life and creation of forms that revalue it. See all show notes and the special playlist on our website.
• 
  Ep 34: The Harlem Renaissance: Early 20th Century Afro-Modernism 05.05.2026 58mnt

  The Harlem Renaissance was not merely a moment. It was a movement, a meditation, a declaration that Black life, Black art, Black thought, and Black being would no longer be bound by the narrow scripts of a nation unsure of its own democracy. In this episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores the Harlem Renaissance as early 20th century Afro-modernism, a transformative period when Black people dared to ask: Who are we beyond the shadow of slavery? Who are we beyond imposed scripts? Who are we when we name ourselves? The New Negro Movement emerged as both a political and philosophical reorientation. It was not merely about rights, though it demanded them. It was about redefinition, replacing the old Negro (a figure fabricated by white supremacist imagination) with a self-determined subject who would speak, create, think, and act on their own terms. The Harlem Renaissance was the aesthetic and cultural expression of this deeper movement, the New Negro's heartbeat made audible. Dr. Rabaka examines literary Afro-modernism through the work of Zora Neale Hurston, who wrote with the rhythms of the South and captured Black folk life with dignity and depth, Claude McKay, who gave us defiance in verse, and Langston Hughes, who sang the blues on the page and made poetry move like jazz. These writers refused respectability politics and embraced Blackness in all its complexity. See all show notes and The Harlem Renaissance playlist
• 
  Ep 33: The CAAAS 5-Year Anniversary Episode: Building the Beloved Community at CU Boulder and Beyond, 2021-2026 23.04.2026 42mnt

  "Five years rooted in history, five years reaching toward freedom—this is the work, this is the cause." — Dr. Reiland Rabaka In this special anniversary episode of The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy, Dr. Reiland Rabaka reflects on the first five years of The Center for African and African American Studies/The CAAAS at the University of Colorado Boulder. What began as a vision has become a dynamic and evolving center grounded in research, artistic expression, and community engagement. This episode traces the origins of the center, from years of advocacy to its founding in 2021, shaped by broader movements for justice and collective action. It highlights the center's core pillars as a research hub, an arts space, and a home for building the Beloved Community. Through these efforts, The CAAAS has cultivated intellectual communities, supported creative work, and created pathways for students, artists, and community members to connect and collaborate. Featuring a powerful interview conducted by KGNU, the episode also explores the impact of a historic $2 million investment from university leadership. This commitment represents not only institutional support, but a shared belief in the center's mission to expand access, foster dialogue, and build bridges across communities. At its heart, this episode is about more than looking back. It is about looking forward. It asks what it means to build institutions that do more than exist, institutions that actively transform. It invites listeners to reflect on the role of Black Studies in shaping a more just and inclusive future, and on the responsibility we all share in that work. As Dr. Rabaka reminds us throughout the episode, the Beloved Community is not an abstract ideal. It is a daily practice rooted in inclusion, creativity, and collective care. See all show notes and articles on The CAAAS on our website
• 
  Ep 32: Black Studies at CU Boulder and Beyond: Honoring Dr. Charles Nilon and Mrs. Mildred Nilon 09.04.2026 37mnt

  This special episode of The Cause brings listeners to a powerful moment of remembrance held on February 16, 2026, marking the installation of a Bench by the Road through the Toni Morrison Society in honor of Dr. Charles Nilon and Mrs. Mildred Nilon. More than a commemorative event, this gathering stands as a public act of memory, recognition, and responsibility. The bench, simple in form yet profound in meaning, invites reflection on the long and often unrecognized history of Black intellectual life at the University of Colorado Boulder. Dr. Charles Nilon, the university's first Black professor, played a foundational role in establishing the Black Studies program in 1969, helping to carve out intellectual space where none previously existed. Mrs. Mildred Nilon, the university's first Black librarian, expanded access to knowledge and ensured that the archive could speak where it had too often been silent. Together, their work helped lay the foundation for what would become a thriving and evolving field of study grounded in truth, inclusion, and transformation. Featuring remarks from Chancellor Justin Schwartz and a powerful reflection from Dr. Reiland Rabaka, this episode moves from memory to movement, asking listeners not only to honor the past but to carry its lessons forward. It reminds us that Black Studies is not a static discipline, but a living practice rooted in struggle, shaped by community, and sustained through action. This episode also highlights the broader significance of the Bench by the Road Project, which creates spaces for public memory and acknowledges histories that have too often gone unmarked. See all show notes on our website
• 
  Ep 31: The Feminist Art Movement 26.03.2026 46mnt

  In this episode of The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores the feminist art movement as a vital site of resistance, cultural production, and social transformation. Moving across historical moments and artistic traditions, this conversation examines how feminist artists have challenged exclusion, disrupted dominant narratives, and redefined the boundaries of representation. Grounded in Black feminist thought and broader feminist traditions, the episode highlights how art becomes a powerful medium for confronting systems of power while creating new possibilities for visibility, voice, and agency. Dr. Rabaka situates the feminist art movement within ongoing struggles for justice, asking listeners to consider how creative expression not only reflects society but actively participates in reshaping it. See full show notes and the Feminist Movement playlist
• 
  Ep 30: The Women's Liberation Movement 12.03.2026 42mnt

  What is Women's Liberation? It is more than a slogan, more than a season, more than a symbolic seat at a table built by patriarchy. Women's liberation is the radical reimagining of the world itself. It is the audacious assertion that women are not property, not afterthought, not footnotes to male ambition, but full human beings endowed with intellect, imagination, agency, and authority. In this essential episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores the history, philosophy, and ongoing legacy of the Women's Liberation Movement. The episode traces how the movement redefined freedom, not only in law and policy but in homes, workplaces, classrooms, and cultural life. What did it mean to declare that "the personal is political"? How did second-wave feminism expand earlier women's rights struggles? And why did many non-White women challenge mainstream feminism for failing to address the intertwined realities of race, class, and sexuality? The Women's Liberation Movement emerged in the late 1960s as a radical wing of second-wave feminism. While earlier movements centered on securing the vote, the Women's Liberation Movement insisted that oppression did not end at the ballot. It lived in the workplace, in the home, in the bedroom, and in culture where women were objectified and infantilized. See full show notes and the curated playlist on our website 
• 
  Ep 29: Afrofuturism: Black Freedom, Black Philosophy, Black Future 26.02.2026 58mnt

  What is Afrofuturism, and why does it matter now? In this episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores Afrofuturism as more than a cultural trend. It is a philosophy of freedom, a political imagination, and a practice of worldmaking rooted in the Black Freedom Struggle. It is what happens when Black artists, thinkers, and communities refuse the lie that the future belongs to someone else. The future has never been neutral. For Black people across Africa and the African diaspora, the future has often been treated as something they were not supposed to have, not supposed to inherit, not supposed to build, not supposed to dream. But they did, they do, they will. Dr. Rabaka traces Afrofuturism's evolution from the Harlem Renaissance to the Black Arts Movement to Hip Hop, examining key figures who shaped Afrofuturist thought: Sun Ra's cosmic jazz and ontological philosophy, George Clinton and Parliament/Funkadelic's funk futurism, Octavia E. Butler's survival ethics and speculative realism, Samuel R. Delany's expansion of the genre's philosophical range, Kodwo Eshun's theory of time as struggle, Alondra Nelson's intellectual infrastructure building, Drexciya's reimagining of the Middle Passage, Janelle Monáe's android narratives and queer futurity, and Wangechi Mutu's visual philosophy of embodiment. See all of our shownotes and our specially curated playlist on our website
• 
  Ep 28: Black History Month Centennial, 1926–2026: One Hundred Years of Black History Month 12.02.2026 46mnt

  "If a race has no history, if it has no worthwhile tradition, it becomes a negligible factor in the thought of the world, and it stands in danger of being exterminated." — Dr. Carter G. Woodson In 2026, we mark 100 years of Black History Month. One hundred years of intentional remembering, rigorous study, and collective struggle around Black life and Black humanity. One hundred years of insisting that Black history is not a footnote to American history but central, foundational, and indispensable. In this special centennial episode, Dr. Reiland Rabaka pays tribute to Dr. Carter G. Woodson, the historian and activist who founded Negro History Week in 1926. Born in 1875 to formerly enslaved parents, Woodson understood that the erasure of Black history was strategic and political. He believed that a people cut off from their past are easier to dominate in the present and to deny a future. Dr. Rabaka explores how Negro History Week evolved into Black History Month by 1976, reflecting broader cultural shifts including the Civil Rights Movement, the Black Power Movement, and global decolonization. The shift from "Negro" to "Black" reflected a reclamation of identity, dignity, and power. This episode examines four essential questions: What is Black History Month and where did it come from? Why does it matter for anyone committed to justice and democracy? Why is 2026 such a consequential year? And why does Black History Month remain urgently relevant in the 21st century? Dr. Rabaka makes clear that Black History Month is for anyone who believes American history should be told honestly. To study Black history is to study the unfinished project of American democracy and to learn how ordinary people forced extraordinary change. The episode features an original poem, "Sankofa and the Mathematics of Survival," exploring the Akan principle from Ghana, West Africa. Sankofa teaches that knowledge is cumulative, wisdom is layered, and forgetting is dangerous. It means critical retrieval, ethical remembrance, and purposeful return in service of collective renewal. As we mark this centennial, Dr. Rabaka confronts the danger of misremembering: nostalgia without commitment, reverence without responsibility. The struggles of countless ancestors were not meant to be admired. They were meant to be enacted. See the full show notes and the Black History Month playlist on our website.
• 
  Ep 27: The Beloved Community, Part 2: Martin Luther King, "I Have a Dream," and the Beloved Community 29.01.2026 37mnt

  Episode Date: January 29, 2026 "The danger of the 'I Have a Dream' speech is not that it is remembered, but that it is remembered incorrectly. It is misremembered. The danger is nostalgia without commitment, reverence without responsibility. Dr. King's dream was not meant to be admired. It was meant to be enacted." - Dr. Reiland Rabaka In this concluding episode of our two-part series, Dr. Reiland Rabaka returns to one of the most quoted speeches in American history, but this time with sharper questions and deeper listening. What happens when a radical call for justice gets remembered without its demands? What did Martin Luther King Jr. actually say on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963, and what have we chosen to forget? Dr. Rabaka explores how King's masterful use of language (anaphora, metaphor, allusion, imagery, and symbol) expanded our collective capacity to imagine the Beloved Community. He examines how King used the speech to bring together people across lines of race, class, religion, region, and politics, while never diluting his demands for structural change. Through historical context, cultural analysis, and powerful poetic reflection, this episode reminds us that the Beloved Community was never meant to be an abstraction or a metaphor. It was, and remains, a call to action. The episode also reflects on the essential role of music, memory, and Black cultural traditions in sustaining movements for change across generations. From spirituals to freedom songs, from gospel to hip hop, music has functioned as protest, prayer, pedagogy, and prophecy. Dr. Rabaka offers an original poem, "We Dreamed of a World," as a contemporary response to King's vision, translating the ideals and imagery of the "I Have a Dream" speech into poetic form for the 21st century. This episode confronts a challenge that belongs to all of us: Why is it not enough to quote the speech, but necessary to build on Dr. King's conception of the Beloved Community today? Because a dream deferred can become a dream denied unless it is made real. See show notes and a special curated playlist
• 
  Ep 26: The Beloved Community Part I: Martin Luther King and the Beloved Community 15.01.2026 36mnt

  "The Beloved Community is not a place we arrive at, but a practice we embody in relationship with one another." - Dr. Reiland Rabaka In this first part of our January series, Dr. Reiland Rabaka explores the meaning, origins, and practical demands of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s vision for the Beloved Community. Far from an abstract ideal, the Beloved Community represents a way of being and acting in the world that places justice, love, care, and collective responsibility at the center of democratic life. Dr. Rabaka situates this vision within historical struggles for freedom, Black intellectual traditions, spiritual commitments toward community care, and democratic practice. He invites listeners to consider the Beloved Community not as a distant destination, but as a practice of relationship and responsibility that begins here and now. This episode is connected to the newly launched Beloved Community Program: The CAAAS's Social Outreach, Community Engagement, and Public Education Arm, an initiative that extends The Center for African and African American Studies/The CAAAS mission beyond the academy and into broader community life, centering shared inquiry, cultural education, and social engagement rooted in justice and collective care. This Part I release is paired with a specially curated Beloved Community playlist, designed as a seasonal and ongoing accompaniment for reflection, learning, and action. See show notes and a special curated playlist
• 
  Ep 25: Kwanzaa: A Celebration of Culture, Family, and Community 18.12.2025 50mnt

  "Kwanzaa tells us we are the harvest our ancestors dreamed of and the seeds of new worlds not yet born." - Dr. Reiland Rabaka In this powerful and timely episode of The Cause: Conversations on Music, History, and Democracy, Dr. Reiland Rabaka offers a deeply rooted meditation on Kwanzaa as a cultural practice, a philosophical framework, and a living tradition born from the Black Freedom Movement. More than a holiday, Kwanzaa emerges here as a week long ritual of remembrance, reflection, and renewal that affirms African and African diasporic dignity, creativity, and collective responsibility. Drawing on history, music, art, and political struggle, Dr. Rabaka explores the origins of Kwanzaa and its continued relevance in a world marked by division, inequality, and democratic uncertainty. At the heart of the celebration are the Nguzo Saba, the Seven Principles of Kwanzaa, which serve as ethical guides for community building and cultural restoration. This episode invites listeners to engage Kwanzaa not only as a seasonal observance, but as a way of being rooted in intention, memory, and collective possibility. Explore the curated Kwanzaa playlist and show notes, and join us in carrying these principles beyond the candles and into everyday practice.