Harlem’s Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: The Body At Its Finest

He scored the most points in NBA history. Six-time MVP, six NBA championships, the invention of the sky hook—which no one else has ever mastered—and the reason the dunk shot was banned in college basketball from 1967 to 1976: these are among Harlem resident Kareem Abdul-Jabbar‘s accomplishments. Considered by many one of the greatest and most graceful athletes in the last half-century, Abdul-Jabbar is also a longtime practitioner of yoga and an author. His books include On the Shoulders of Giants: My Journey Through the Harlem Renaissance and Brothers in Arms, the story of an all-black tank battalion on the front lines during World War II. In this program at the Chicago Humanities Festival, he discusses the transcendence of sport and the body when put to its finest, most beautiful, and in many ways most pure use.