Entertainment

Angelina Jolie Undergoes Further Preventive Surgery

Published

11 years ago

March 24, 2015

In this Nov. 27, 2014 file photo, director Angelina Jolie poses for photographers during a photo call for her film “Unbroken” in Berlin, Germany. Jolie announced in an op-ed in The New York Times on Tuesday, March 24, 2015, that she had her ovaries and fallopian tubes removed to prevent cancer. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn)

DANICA KIRKA, Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — Oscar-winning actress Angelina Jolie revealed Tuesday that she has undergone more preventive surgery, having her ovaries and fallopian tubes removed in hopes of reducing her risk of cancer.

Writing in The New York Times, the filmmaker and philanthropist said a recent blood test showed a possible early sign of cancer. The news was a blow to the star who had already had a double mastectomy.

“I went through what I imagine thousands of other women have felt,” she wrote. “I told myself to stay calm, to be strong, and that I had no reason to think I wouldn’t live to see my children grow up and to meet my grandchildren.”

Jolie, 39, revealed two years ago that she carries a defective breast cancer gene that puts her at high risk of developing breast and ovarian cancer. Her mother died of ovarian cancer, and her maternal grandmother also had ovarian cancer — strong evidence of an inherited, genetic risk that led the actress to have her healthy breasts removed to try to avoid the same fate.

Only a small percentage of women inherit the same faulty gene, known as BRCA1 — the name stands for breast cancer susceptibility gene. These mutations are most commonly found in women of Eastern European Jewish descent, though other groups, including the Norwegian, Dutch and Icelandic, also have slightly higher rates of these mutations.

The average woman has a 12 percent risk of developing breast cancer sometime during her life. Women who have inherited a faulty BRCA gene are about five times more likely to get breast cancer.

Jolie said that while having the gene mutation alone was not a reason to resort to surgery — other medical options were possible — her family history influenced her decision to have further surgery now. The surgery puts a woman in menopause and Jolie wrote she’s now taking hormones.

Her courageous decision to publicly announce her double mastectomy was praised as a watershed moment in efforts to persuade women to get breast cancer screening — and to raise awareness of the need for early detection. The same sense of mission led her to write about her follow-up care, although she said her decision wasn’t necessarily the right one for everyone.

“There is more than one way to deal with any health issue,” she wrote. “The most important thing is to learn about the options and choose what is right for you personally.”

Coming forward to tell her story will play a vital role in raising awareness, those who work for cancer charities say. They hope other women at risk will be encouraged to speak with their doctors.

“Angelina Jolie has made a really brave decision,” Katherine Taylor, acting chief executive of Ovarian Cancer Action. “It immediately puts the person into surgical menopause so it is not a decision to take lightly.”

Jolie’s article makes plain the anguish the results of the new blood tests brought. She said she immediately called her husband, the actor Brad Pitt, who flew home from France within hours.

“The beautiful thing about such moments in life is that there is so much clarity,” she wrote. “You know what you live for and what matters. It is polarizing, and it is peaceful.”

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COMMENTARY: Black Music is the Sound of Black Freedom: Let Us Reclaim Both This Juneteenth

Black Music Month started when Black Music Association members Ed Wright, Kenny Gamble and his wife, journalist and radio host Dyanna Williams were able to persuade President Jimmy Carter to establish the observation on June 7, 1979.

Published

18 hours ago

June 9, 2026

Oakland Post

Robert Johnson (1911-1938) is thought of as the godfather of blues music, especially Delta blues. The 29 songs recorded by him during his short life have been of massive inspiration to guitarists and musicians over the last 80 years. Public domain photo.

By Wanda Ravernell

Black Music Month and Juneteenth are inextricably linked – Black music is the sound of our freedom.

From the plaintive moans of the enslaved Africans’ ‘sorrow songs,’ to the fields of Civil War battle where Black soldiers picked up abandoned bugles, to the upright piano played in juke joints on Saturday night and churches come Sunday morning, our ancestors’ innovation in the face of want, fear, degradation, and hopelessness has yielded genres of music imitated ’round the world.

In 2000, Congress made it official. In 2009, Pres. Barack Obama changed the name to African American Music Heritage Month and in 2023, Pres. Joe Biden changed it back to Black Music Month, two years after he declared Juneteenth a national holiday, the result of a movement led by Opal Lee.

Our ancestors battle for freedom over these last 400 years and the music that allowed them expression of their humanity deserved to be honored.

But we may be losing sight of the value of their sacrifices.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Faith That the Dark past Has Taught Us…’

Along with the long-known exploitation of Black musicians whose recordings were stolen by record companies, the commercialization of Juneteenth feels like another kind of theft.

I had never heard of Juneteenth until I moved to the Bay Area from my hometown of Philadelphia. I didn’t know it was one of many freedom festivals celebrated by descendants of enslaved people in the United States.

Emancipation Day was Jan. 1 in Pennsylvania, April 16 in Wash., D.C., May 20 in Florida, and Aug. 8 in Kentucky. But Juneteenth, June 19, has the most renown, known in Texas as the ‘colored peoples’ Fourth of July.’

It was marked by parades, beauty pageants, rodeos, backyard barbecues and church picnics.

Yes, church.

The formerly enslaved began the day praying in thanks for their freedom just as they had prayed for Jubilee – the day of freedom – when they had chains on their feet and hands. They ‘testified’ about their past suffering and how they had managed to overcome.

And they sang.

Although, we will not hold it this year, Omnira Institute’s Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance recalled this part of Juneteenth with prayers in the languages of the African captives. In the middle of the ceremony, a soloist would lead us in singing “Many Thousand Gone” while we took turns reciting portions of the Emancipation Proclamation, the news of freedom that took more than two years to reach Texas – two months after the Civil War ended.

“Many Thousand Gone” was famously recorded by Black luminary Paul Robeson in 1947:

“No more auction block for me,

No more, no more

No more auction black for me

Many thousand gone.”

Other verses refer to the ‘pint of salt’ and the ‘driver’s lash,’ the realities of enslavement that they had survived.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Hope That the Present has Brought Us’

All of the genres of African American music have at their root songs like that, the essence being, as Stevie Wonder, wrote, “the joy inside our pain.” So Black music is not just music. It is our story, our history, our very strength.

During the Civil Rights Movement, which peaked 100 years after slavery ended, the people testified that it was the freedom songs – based on spirituals – that gave them the heart to march, face attack dogs, fire hoses, beatings, and shootouts with vigilantes.

The music reminded them that power was in the people. That music, our music, can do so again. We don’t have to accept the commodification of the products of our culture.

The power of those songs is showing a resurgence across the South as we battle again for the right to self-determination through the ballot box.

Those songs are the voices of our ancestors, voices forged in their blood, their sweat, their tears, joy and, above all, faith. Those songs, those prayers live in our blood and our very breath.

This Juneteenth, let us reclaim those holy voices expressed in Black music for ourselves. It is our birthright. It can neither be bought nor sold. No more. Never again.

Wanda Ravernell is the executive director of Omnira Institute, sponsor for 18 years of the Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance and Oakland’s 11^th Annual Black-Eyed Pea Festival, which will take place on Sept. 12.