Directions: Read the summary, watch the video and answer the discussion questions. Follow along using the transcript. If time permits, read the following articles with your students: “Virginia’s Gov. Northam says that wasn’t him in racist photo” or “Blackface photo spotlights deeply embedded racism in U.S.”

Summary: Virginia’s Democratic governor Ralph Northam is in the news after a photo of people in blackface and Ku Klux Klan costumes surfaced on his page of the 1984 medical school yearbook. Northam says he is not the person in the photo, although he admits he wore blackface on a separate occasion. The governor is facing calls to resign from members of his own party. NewsHour’s Yamiche Alcindor talks to Duke University’s Mark Anthony Neal and The Atlantic’s Vann Newkirk about the racist history of blackface in America and why it is so hurtful.

For background reading about the history of blackface in the US and classroom discussion questions, explore the support materials.

February 5, 2019 video and resource materials from PBS NewsHour.

Check out our Daily News Story collection, or find more at PBS NewsHour Extra.