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This week in black women: Luvvie, 6th-grade superstars, The Lion Queen, and more.

Indictments fell like leaves. Baseball finally ended. And black women had another week of being intelligent, talented, innovative, and fearless.

This is the second edition of "This week in black women," a weekly column dedicated to signal-boosting the black women who make the world spin.

This week, we shoutout a Hollywood hotshot, a writer making big moves, children inspiring millions from their classroom, and a judge doing work. Celebrate them! Follow them! Support them! Let's go!

"Go off, sis": Luvvie Ajayi

The best-selling author and blogger was the opening speaker for the TEDWomen conference in New Orleans. Through presentations, discussions, and other events, the annual three-day conference centers women and girls as the innovators, change agents, and creators they are. Not 24 hours later, Ajayi was in New York City delivering the keynote address at The 3% Conference, a movement and event created to address the lack of women creative directors in advertising (only 3% when the effort began).

‌Photo by John Sciulli/Getty Images for Adcolor. ‌

"Take care of business": U.S. Magistrate Judge Deborah A. Robinson

Presiding over the preliminary portion of Paul Manafort and Rick Gates' indictments was none other than Deborah A. Robinson, a jurist with nearly 30 years of experience behind the bench. As a judge in the district, Robinson is no stranger to high-profile defendants, hearing cases involving NBA star Allen Iverson; former Washington, D.C., mayor Marion Barry; and George W. Bush's White House aide, Lewis "Scooter" Libby. Prior to her work as a judge, Robinson served as an assistant U.S. prosecuting attorney. Robinson will now hand the case over to U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson.

Images by Dana Verkouteren/AP and Charles Dharapak/AP Photo.

"If you don't know, now you know": Christy Coleman

It's 2017, and folks are still attempting to rewrite Civil War history. If you're looking for a place to brush up on your facts, visit Christy Coleman, CEO of the American Civil War Museum in Richmond, Virginia. The innovative space examines the Civil War from the Confederate, Union, and black perspectives.

Coleman is one of the few black women to lead a Civil War museum and told NBC News this summer, "My job is to lay out stories you may not have considered or heard before and provide an environment where people can learn and explore. And that’s what I do and I do that fairly well."

"Yes, young queens": the sixth-grade MCs at Milwaukee Excellence Charter School

I wrote about Milwaukee Excellence last year after seeing their passionate principal rap about homework. The school and students are going viral again, this time with their empowering student-lead rap "Excellence First" about staying focused and goal-oriented. It was written by their teacher, Terrance Sims, set to the beat from Tee Grizzley's "First Day Out," and tweaked with help from his sixth-grade class.  He held mini tryouts to see who would perform for the video, and these talented tweens rose to the top.

Come for the positive message, stay for two sixth-grade girls spitting 🔥 bars about MBAs and doctorates. The video has more than 86,000 views on Instagram and even landed the students on "Good Morning America."

"Let the people know": Angela Robinson

Last week, I asked you to send me links if you knew of any awesome black women doing amazing things. Molly M. sent me this delightful note:

"I wanted to reach out and propose my best friend Angela Robinson who just wrote and directed the major movie, 'Professor Marston and The Wonder Women.' An awesome woman with major accomplishments to write about, too!"

Robinson has some amazing Hollywood bonafides to her name, working as a writer, director, and producer on shows like "True Blood," "How To Get Away With Murder," and "The L Word." Her latest project, "Professor Marston and the Wonder Women," tells the surprising true story of William Moulton Marston, the psychologist who created Wonder Woman, and the polyamorous relationship he had with his wife and mistress. The complex love story opened Oct. 13 and is Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes.

Hats off to Robinson — a gay, black woman getting it done and finding success in an industry long dominated by white men. (And kudos to Molly for letting people know about her fabulous friend.)

Angela Robinson attends the Professor Marston and the Wonder Women panel  in New York City. Photo by Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images.

Final thoughts: Ziwe

Disney just announced the full cast of the live-action "Lion King," and Beyoncé will take the throne as Nala.  

Where's the lie?

Joy

Airbnb host wakes his guest up in the middle of the night so she wouldn't miss the northern lights

Best. Host. Ever.

@penslucero/TikTok

Pency Lucero taking in the Northern Lights

Seeing the northern lights is a common bucket list adventure for many people. After all, it ticks a lot of boxes—being a dazzling light show, rich historical experience and scientific phenomenon all rolled into one. Plus there’s the uncertainty of it all, never quite knowing if you’ll witness a vivid streak of otherworldly colors dance across the sky…or simply see an oddly colored cloud. It’s nature’s slot machine, if you will.

Traveler and content creator Pency Lucero was willing to take that gamble. After thorough research, she stumbled upon an Airbnb in Rörbäck, Sweden with an actual picture of the northern lights shining above the cabin in the listing. With that kind of photo evidence, she felt good about her odds.

However, as soon as she landed, snow began falling so hard that the entire sky was “barely visible,” she told Upworthy. Martin, the Airbnb host, was nonetheless determined to do everything he could to ensure his guests got to see the spectacle, even offering to wake Lucero up in the middle of the night if he saw anything.

Then one night, the knock came.

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Pop Culture

Daughter shares incredible 3D optical illusions painted by her father, who has aphasia

David Hollowell suffered from a traumatic brain injury in 2021, losing his ability to speak. Remarkably, he is still able to express himself through art.

@david.hollowell/TikTok

David Hollowell pictured with his 3D art

For a little over three decades, David Hollowell’s professional life had been dedicated to art. In addition to working as an art professor, his highly acclaimed 3D illusion paintings were shown in prestigious exhibits. In 2018, the 71-year-old began taking his talents to a larger scale, turning his family barn into an immersive mural.

Then, in May of 2021, Hollowell fell off the roof of his home, resulting in a traumatic brain injury leading to aphasia, a disorder that affects a person’s ability to communicate through speech or written language.

Though Hollowell couldn’t access words the way he used to, his ability to paint detailed, mesmerizing images remained remarkably intact. And his daughter-slash-self-appointed-TikTok manager, Adrienne, is determined to share his work and his journey with as many people as possible.

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Family

Dad found out his son bullied a kid at school and came up with a brilliant teaching moment

"I told him that we have the opportunity to make things right."

@thehalfdeaddad/TikTok

Dad on TikTok shared how he addressed his son's bullying.

What do you do when you find out your kid bullied someone? For many parents, the first step is forcing an apology. While this response is of course warranted, is it really effective? Some might argue that there are more constructive ways of handling the situation that teach a kid not only what they did wrong, but how to make things right again.

Single dadPatrick Forseth recently shared how he made a truly teachable moment out of his son, Lincoln, getting into trouble for bullying. Rather than forcing an apology, Forseth made sure his son was actively part of a solution.


The thought process behind his decision, which he explained in a now-viral TikTok video, is both simple and somewhat racial compared to how many parents have been encouraged to handle similar situations.
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Joy

Australian in the U.S. says she thinks it's rude that Americans don't say 'You're welcome'

Who's being more polite?

via Tilly Hokianga/TikTok and RoseGoldMillie/TikTok

An Australian woman thinks it's rude that Americans don't say, "You're welcome."

There’s been a growing trend amongst American Gen Zers and millennials to stop saying, “You're welcome,” after being thanked. Older generations may think the change is part of a more significant trend of younger people having more lax manners, but in actuality, younger people believe that giving a simple “OK” or “Mm-hmm” after being thanked is more polite than saying, “You're welcome.”

Recently, Australian TikTok user Tilly Hokianga vented her frustrations with Americans in a viral post entitled, “Things That Send Me as an Australian Living in the US.” A lot of the points she made were pretty typical for someone visiting the United States, such as there's too much sugar in the bread and too many options for cereal.

However, she also noted that Americans have difficulty saying, “You’re welcome.”

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Pop Culture

Mississippi meteorologist paused for a 'human' moment while reporting on devastating tornado

"Oh, man. Dear Jesus, please help them."

WTVA 9 News/YouTube

Meteorologist Matt Laubham prays for the people in the path of a deadly tornado.

Broadcasters who have to report on tragedies as they are happening have a tough job. On the one hand, they have to maintain their professionalism and inform the public of what's happening in a factual way. On the other hand, they're still human and sometimes humanity trumps the traditional perception of what's "professional."

Such was the case for WTVA meteorologist Matt Laubhan, who found himself live on the air staring at a radar scan of a deadly tornado as it moved towards the small town of Amory, Mississippi. He, more than anyone, understood the severity of the situation, and he did his best to convey that to his viewers.

"This is a strong, life-threatening tornado that's going to move either extremely close to Amory or in through the northern part of the city of Amory."

He added, "Y'all trust me too much," explaining that people sometimes take his predictions of where the tornado will go as hard fact, but the reality is that tornados can change directions at any time. "So Amory, we need to be in our tornado safe place," he said.

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Pop Culture

Rick Astley covered Foo Fighters' 'Everlong' and it's shockingly great

Consider yourself Rick-Grohled.

Rick Astley/YouTube

Rick Astley rocking his Foo Fighters 'Everlong' cover.

Rick Astley has to be the luckiest '80s musician on the planet. The whole "Rickrolling" phenomenon has given his hit song "Never Gonna Give You Up" a reach far beyond its natural life span, and kept the guy a household name far longer than he probably would have been.

(For those who are unfamiliar, Rickrolling is when you make someone think they're being sent to a website, but the link goes to Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" video instead as a joke. It's a silly viral bait-and-switch gag that's been going since 2006.)

But what people may not realize, because his most famous song has become an internet joke, is that Rick Astley is actually a really freaking great musician. The man can saaaang and it seems he's only gotten better with age.

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