In Black America Since MLK, Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. looks at the last 50 years of African-American history, charting the remarkable progress black people have made and raising hard questions about the obstacles that remain. The series begins at the point where the story Americans tell about themselves becomes complicated and then steps out of the sanctified past and into the complex, raw, conflicted present.

Professor Gates offers a fresh examination of key events and turning points in American race relations and black history over the last five decades. The series is filled with compelling reflections upon key events that have occurred over the last 50 years from African Americans who shaped a shared history. Among those interviewed are Oprah Winfrey, Nas, Ava DuVernay, Jesse Jackson, Dr. Cornel West, Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, Robert L. Johnson, DeRay Mckesson, Charlayne Hunter-Gault, former Attorney General Eric Holder and Shonda Rhimes—as well as eyewitnesses to Hurricane Katrina, public intellectuals, education reformers, police officers in communities that have been shaken by racial unrest and many others.