"Be Like Mike and Talk Like Barack" - New Book, Articulate While Black

Articulate While Black: Barack Obama, Language, and Race in the U.S. explores “language and racial politics in the U.S. through an insightful examination of President Barack Obama's language use--and America's response to it.” Professors H. Samy Alim of Stanford and Geneva Smitherman of Michigan State look at the racializing of linguistic controversies surrounding Obama including the “terrorist fist jab,” comments about his “articulateness,” and his link to the hip hop community. Alim and Smitherman seek to bring the national discourse about race and language to a new level. 

Watch Salim discuss the book on MSNBC's The Cycle.

Record Number of Women Running For Congress in 2012

Today, MSNBC's The Cycle featured a segment on the rise of the number of women running for office this election cycle.

Only 16% of elected officials in Congress are women. In fact, the United States ranks 78th in the world in number of female elected officials.

This fall, a record 334 women are running for positions in the House and Senate.

Guest Lea Goldman of Marie Claire discussed an article in the magazine's latest issue titled "Running in Heels," which profiles 11 of the women working to be elected in November.

You can watch the segment here.