For Black Women, the Oscars Are About More Than Best Picture

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An NAACP flyer campaigning for the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill, which passed the U.S. House of Representatives in 1922, but was filibustered to defeat in the Senate. Dyer, the NAACP, and freedom fighters around the country, like Flossie Baily, struggled for years to get the Dyer and other anti-lynching bills passed, to no avail. Today there is still no U.S. law specifically against lynching. In 2005, eighty of the 100 U.S. Senators voted for a resolution to apologize to victims' families and the country for their failure to outlaw lynching. Courtesy of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

Some Exhibits to Come – One Hundred Years of Jim Crow

Bibliography – One Hundred Years Of Jim Crow

Claude, age 23, just months before his 1930 murder. Courtesy of Faith Deeter.

Freedom’s Heroes During Jim Crow: Flossie Bailey and the Deeters

Souvenir Portrait of the Lynching of Abram Smith and Thomas Shipp, August 7, 1930, by studio photographer Lawrence Beitler. Courtesy of the Indiana Hisorical Society.

An Iconic Lynching in the North

Claxton Dekle – Prosperous Farmer, Husband & Father of Two

Ancient manuscripts about mathematics and astronomy from Timbuktu, Mali

Some Exhibits to Come – African Peoples Before Captivity

Shackles for Adults & Children from the Henrietta Marie

Some Exhibits to Come – The Middle Passage

What I Saw Aboard a Slave Ship in 1829

Life After Hate: A Former White Power Leader Redeems Himself

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March 16, 2026

by Regina Davis Moss, WordInBlack

The contrast between “Sinners” and “One Battle After Another” shows how Hollywood narratives shape policy, power, and whose lives are valued.

Wunmi Mosaku and Teyana Taylor attend the 31st Annual Critics Choice Awards at Barker Hangar on January 04, 2026 in Santa Monica, California. (Photo by John Shearer/Getty Images for Critics Choice Association)

Black women are paying close attention to this year’s Oscars — and we all have a stake in the outcome.

The stark contrast between the portrayals of Black women in two leading Best Picture contenders, “One Battle After Another” and “Sinners,” has lit a firestorm in both private and public conversations. We celebrate the recognition of Black excellence for actors like Teyana Taylor, Wunmi Mosaku, and Chase Infiniti. But these portrayals matter far beyond who earns a golden statue.

The cultural influence of how Black women are depicted on screen shapes what people believe we deserve — and those beliefs color policy debates, funding decisions, and whose pain gets taken seriously.

Continue reading…For Black Women, the Oscars Are About More Than Best Picture

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