Hana Baba

From our new series Bay Views, a segment where we ask someone to go deep and think about an aspect of their Bay Area life that touches on a larger issue. Today, we’ll take a look from here at turmoil happening in Sudan, host Hana Baba's home country.

A lot has changed in the 50 years since the strike at San Francisco State University brought about the country’s first ethnic studies program. Today, ethnic etudies courses are offered nationwide.

The Camp fire in Butte County burned down more than 15 thousand structures. Evacuation centers are filling up. The town of Paradise suffered a huge portion of the devastation: death and destruction.

According to a study released this spring by San Francisco’s Department of Aging and Adult Services, almost 30% of San Francisco residents will be age 60 or older by 2030. And almost 30% of seniors are living alone.

Living with regular racial discrimination is a reality for many people. It can affect them psychologically, and even lead to depression. Now, a new study out of UC Berkeley found that those effects can also be physical.

Ever since high school, people have pronounced Irma Herrera’s name wrong. When she'd correct their pronunciation, they'd ask where she was from, as if it was a foreign name. “I’m a fifth generation South Texan,” she’d say.

A new clinical trial in the National Bureau of Economic Research studied 1,300 black men in Oakland to see if race was a factor in determining whether they seek preventative care services. Owen Garrick, president and CEO of Bridge Clinical Research, co-wrote the study.

When you hear the term ‘Black Muslims’ what may come to mind is the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X, or, if you’re from the Oakland, the controversial Your Black Muslim Bakery. Local filmmaker Nijla Mu’min wants to tell a different story.

A young musician in Oakland is making waves in the Muslim community: Alia Sharrief. She’s part of a new generation of Muslim hip hop artists following in the footsteps of people like Yasiin Bey, best known by his stagename, MosDef, Lupe Fiasco, Qtip, Ali Shaheed Mohamed, the list goes on.

When people migrate to the US, they have to deal with lots and lots of paperwork, to be able to live and work in the country. When you’re here and you’re petitioning for your spouse or children to join you from another country, it’s even more paperwork. It can get confusing and overwhelming, especially if you don’t know English.

Just over two weeks ago, 18-year-old Oakland resident Nia Wilson, a black woman, was stabbed and killed by a white man while on the MacArthur BART platform. News outlets reported the story, including KTVU Channel 2, the local Fox affiliate. But, in its broadcast, the network used a photo of Wilson holding up her phone case, which looks like a gun. That led to outrage and protest that using that photo was unethical and harmful. Shortly after, community members took their protest to the station.

Earlier this month, the East African countries of Ethiopia and Eritrea signed a peace deal, after decades of severed relations. The two nations fought a war in the 1990s after which all connection was cut off. No diplomatic ties, no trade, no transport — not even phone lines — despite a shared heritage and decades of intermarriage and close cultural ties.

The Supreme Court upheld President Trump's travel ban preventing nationals from 5 majority-Muslim countries, plus North Korea and Venezuela, from entering the US. The administration put the policy in place to "protect US citizens from terrorist attacks and other public-safety threats," but many are referring to it simply as a “Muslim ban.” Amal Alaoudi shares how the ban has affected life for her and her family.

When the travel ban was first announced, many people were outraged — nationally and here in the Bay Area. At SFO, people brought signs and stood in the arrivals hall chanting to make their point against the ban. Now that the Supreme Court has upheld the ban, it’s become harder for activists, human rights lawyers, and community organizers to help those affected by it.

As the nation has been following for weeks now, thousands of migrant children coming to the United States are separated from their families at the Southern border.

This story originally aired in May of 2015. 

Islam has a rich artistic heritage of architecture, design, music, painting, and poetry. Muslim poets like Rumi and Hafez are famous for a depth and beauty that defies time. Today, that poetic tradition is still strong. It's kept alive in what many may perhaps consider an unlikely place—urban America, through the genre of hip hop.

This story originally aired in 2015. 

Through much of their history, Sunni and Shia Muslims have lived peacefully together in countries like Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq. But since the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, sectarian conflict has escalated in the region. Here in the Bay Area,  around 75% of Muslims identify as Sunni, just four percent identify as Shia.

The Stoop podcast is hosted by KALW's Hana Baba and Leila Day. 

In this episode we explore colorism — discrimination based on skin tone, which has happened for decades in Black communities.

For the first time in nearly a decade, Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O'Malley is running against an opponent.

Pamela Price is an African American civil rights attorney who says she wants to create change in Alameda County's criminal justice systems.

When we experience trauma as children — whether it’s the stress of an abusive parent, divorce, substance abuse, or the effects of poverty — do these traumatic events affect our lives even when we grow up?

According to Pew Research, 75 percent of Americans have smartphones. Most of us are using them for GPS directions, and about 70 percent of Americans are on some kind of social media.  Roughly two thirds on Facebook.

A 2015 industry survey found that about 80 percent of those working in publishing are white.

Later this month, Starbucks plans to close down 8,000 of its stores to train its employees on implicit bias. This comes after a manager kicked two Black men out of a Starbucks in Philadelphia in April.

Last Wednesday, Grace Cathedral hosted an event that got national attention: a Beyoncé Mass.

When filling out the United States census, Egyptians, Moroccans, Iranians, and many other people from the Middle East and North Africa have always had to check the box 'White' or other. There’s no Middle Eastern or North African box. This is problematic because these communities rely on representation when it comes to things like legislative redistricting and health statistics—in addition to the cultural inaccuracy of calling them white in the American context. 

This is part of our series  “Persistent Poison: Lead’s Toxic Legacy in the Bay Area,” an in-depth look at childhood lead poisoning in the region.

Oakland’s Faisal Zedan is a musician from a village in southern Syria. Growing up, his family loved music, and he grew to be obsessed with Arabic drums called darabukkas.

When we have conversations about war and refuge, we sometimes forget our children are listening. So how do you talk to kids about things like the war in Syria?

That’s what Union City children’s author Naheed Senzai tackled in her new novel for middle schoolers, Escape from Aleppo. The story follows 14-year old Nadia as she makes her way out of the devastation of war.

Scholars from around the country are at UC Berkeley this week for a conference exploring racial justice. It’s called "Race & Inequality in America: The Kerner Commission at 50."