The Compass

How are black Americans represented and what does it mean to be black in America today? Rajini Vaidyanathan discusses with those involved in politics, culture and activism.Travelling widely across the country she hears from families in Atlanta, activists in Missouri and academics in New York City. She speaks to the artist Kehinde Wiley about his subversive attempts to literally paint power differently; to the poet Tracy K. Smith about the vital role stories can play in encouraging empathy and hears from the civil rights icon John Lewis why he is using comic books to tell his story.Rajini discusses what is taught in schools, what is shown on TV, and how the reality of being black in America means new black migrants to the United States are increasingly retaining their immigrant identity to avoid being considered ‘African American’. She discusses the next generation of leadership, who can authentically lead the Black Lives Matter movement, and attends a remarkable convention in Baltimore encouraging Americans t

Rajini Vaidyanathan examines segregation. The Brown versus the Board of Education case and the civil rights movement were supposed to have brought Americans together, but in Kansas City Rajini sees for herself the much more complicated legacy of desegregation. On the one hand, splintering solidarity in the black community; on the other a city where white and black Americans still live quite separate lives. Demographers suggest America is becoming less segregated, but in Atlanta, one of the big southern cities supposedly driving the desegregation, she finds the reality doesn’t quite match the statistics. Catching up with a family featured throughout the series, she finds estate agents steering black families away from white neighbourhoods. She discusses that with Julian Castro, the US Housing Secretary, and hears about his new rules to get communities integrating. And in Connecticut she sees a community which has spent 20 years integrating its schools, without requiring it of anyone.Rally in Brooklyn, New York

Rajini Vaidyanathan explores economic opportunity – or lack of it - amongst black Americans. She speaks to the academic whose study suggests employers think being black is as bad as having a criminal record but that they weren’t trying to be racist, and hears from senior corporate executives who have witnessed the subtle ways racial prejudice operates in the workplace.In Kansas City she explains how government rules established during the New Deal locked black Americans out of home ownership for a generation, in west Philadelphia she meets the civic leaders with a comprehensive plan to improve the city’s poor, black neighbourhoods, and she hears from the San Francisco non-profit trying to reduce the very high cost of being poor.(Photo: A man and woman on a street in Baltimore, Maryland. Credit: Patrick Smith/Getty Images)

Rajini investigates the criminal justice system. In Nebraska she visits the conservative politician promoting laws to reduce the number of people behind bars. Will that help black Americans? “I hope so” he answers.Elsewhere she hears from critics who argue that the system can never be reformed, only broken; that the system is not fair, the police need to be disarmed. She visits the police chief advising President Obama on the way forward, who acknowledges the problem but argues that “all black lives matter”, including those killed by crime, and that protesters must accept that the police are part of the solution. Rajini also spends time with the police force teaching all its officers how to be ‘ethical protectors’.Protests against shootings of young black men by the police have pushed the issue of race to the top of the public agenda in the United States. Now BBC Washington correspondent Rajini Vaidyanathan, who has covered many of the recent protests, sets out to examine some of the deep, underlying structur

During the last four years California has been ravaged by drought and wildfire that has left people without homes and farmers without crops. Unlike a lot of American states most Californians acknowledge climate change is contributing to serious environmental problems and Governor Jerry Brown is leading the way in developing strategies to try and combat it. In the final programme in the Local Warming series presenter Sasha Khokha takes a trip around her home state of California to see what climate change means to people and how far they are willing to go to address it.(Photo: Interviewee Jessica Pyska infront of her burnt home. Credit: Sasha Khokha)

Extreme weather has claimed many lives in the Philippines. The archipelago has been battered by so-called ‘Super Typhoons’ and only last month, Super Typhoon Koppu wreaked havoc in the northern island of Luzon, killing 60 and leaving hundreds of thousands evacuated from their homes. Another storm two years ago left thousands dead. Meanwhile, climate change is said to be impacting crops and reducing yields. So it might come as a surprise that Filipinos, as a nation, are far from the most climate aware people on earth. Indeed some of the most vulnerable, living in isolated rural areas, might know little about the issues around emissions and global warming. In this programme, Filipino reporter Nicole Jacinto asks why, and meets some of those determined to change the situation.(Photo: A man shelters from the wind in the aftermath of Super Typhoon Haiyan. Credit: Getty Images)

The first episode focuses on Nigeria, where migration caused by desertification is leading to bloodshed as cattle herders move south from their traditional routes and into conflict with settled farmers. Meanwhile, increasingly intense rainfall in southern Nigeria causes flooding and creates enormous gulleys which are swallowing houses, farmland and even schools. Presented by Ugochi Oluigbo - a business and environment correspondent and news anchor for TVC News in Nigeria – the programme asks how far Nigerians can afford to take action over global matters like climate change. Yet somehow the country has to adapt. Ugochi explores how climate change is making an impact on women in rural Nigeria. She also discovers how young people in Nigeria are engaging with the issue. (Image: Ugochi Oluigbo and Prof. Damian Asawalam examine an erosion gulley in Imo State, Nigeria. Credit: BBC)

Is prolonged adolescence actually a good thing? Jake Wallis Simons explores whether life choices offered up by delaying financial independence, marriage and forming a family are actually better for you. We hear how the transition to adulthood in the UK has extended over the last 50 years with young people having the opportunity to develop their own selves, travel and form their own identities. Jake also looks at what role class and wealth play in shaping the life choices and the waiting period for young people.(Photo: Jack from Camberwell, London, UK. Credit: Sophie Wedgwood)

A trip to Italy where one of Ghana’s most respected hip-hop artists, Sarkodie, is set to perform in Modena. It is home to a large Ghanaian diaspora but what is life like for young Ghanaians who have moved abroad? We also hear from young people in Italy where almost a third of adults live with their parents, and in Barcelona where the economic crisis is still affecting the young, who discuss what it means to become a grown up in the 21st Century.

What does it mean to be a grown-up in the 21st Century? If the path to maturity is about stable work, marriage and a home for your family where does that leave those who haven't achieved these goals? In the first of three programmes Jake Wallis Simons meets young graduates in Ghana who dream of greater things but find the passage to adulthood blocked. Jobs are hard to come by and one student, Kwabena Ankrah, tells us that if you are a graduate in Ghana, you are in the wrong place. If you don’t have a job then it is hard to attract a wife. And, if you do not have a wife you are seen as irresponsible, impotent. For Dr Samuel Ntewusu from the University of Ghana, the problems of waithood are caused by impatience and consumerism. He feels that many would not accept jobs in the north or west of the country - instead they feel their futures lies elsewhere. A large proportion of Ghana’s young hope to leave for Europe and America but do their dreams match the reality?(Photo: Eric and David, bus driver and his appre