Legislators met this week to tackle the task of redrawing congressional maps . The first meeting determined Republicans want to use the maps created for the advocacy group Common Cause North Carolina, while Democrats want to start from scratch. A three-judge panel ruled last week that the gerrymandered districts be redrawn in time for the 2020 election.

A teenage girl’s most intimate space is her bedroom. It is a place where she figures out who she is and tries on new identities. As Lebanese-American photographer Rania Matar watched her own daughters become teenagers, she became increasingly curious about the magic of that space.

Thomas Taylor Jr. is fostering an appreciation of jazz legends like John Coltrane and Thelonious Monk among the state’s underground hip-hop scene. The professor of percussion at North Carolina Central University sees North Carolina’s long history in blues and jazz as a natural foundation for today’s emcees. In his classes, Taylor invites aspiring rappers to improvise with him in front of the class — him on the drums, them with their words. Two students from that course now freestyle with him

When scholar Kate Bowler went to an evangelical bible camp at the age of 14, she was confronted with a new take on what it means to be a Christian: girls should submit and focus their energy on becoming good wives and mothers. Bowler pushed back against this philosophy.

A lawyer connected to some members of the University of North Carolina Board of Governors misrepresented his connection to powerful people in state government for access to the damaging video footage of former East Carolina University interim chancellor Dan Gerlach.

Oberlin Village is an important part of Raleigh’s history — but there is not much of the historic African American community left.

North Carolina seeks to close antiquated loopholes in sexual assault laws and add more protections for child abuse victims.

Zena Cardman knew she might not have another opportunity to pursue poetry. She was about to dive into graduate research on microbiology in extreme environments when she put that plan on ice, and opted to write a poetry collection for her undergraduate thesis at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

From the time she was young, musician and writer Cameron Dezen Hammon craved a spiritual connection with the world around her.

Emma and Tyler Millard have their own separate, busy musical careers, but when they perform and write together, they deliver a sound that is moody and intimate. The couple pen tales that conjure the ghosts of the past and dig into feelings of nostalgia, often infused with a healthy dose of humor. While Emma’s musical roots go back to classical training in her youth, Tyler picked up a guitar as he faced the ever-advancing degenerative eye condition Retinitis pigmentosa. Today, Tyler is legally