Especially during the 2020 election cycle, when conservatives were citing “ critical race theory” as a pressing danger, Hannah-Jones became the official face of the Black woman boogeyman - a scary militant whose sole joy in life was making white people look bad. Though she won a Pulitzer and praise from voices as influential as Vice President Kamala Harris, Hannah-Jones also found herself on the receiving end of harsh rebukes - mainly from conservatives who accused her of everything from factual inaccuracy to race-baiting.Īs attacks continued (with a good deal of them from elected officials including Mitch McConnell and the former president), so did Hannah-Jones’ fierce, funny, and unflinching clapbacks on Twitter. First an in-depth magazine piece at The New York Times before becoming a book of scholarly research and essays, her work - which frames the year 1619 as the defining moment in American history since that’s when the first enslaved Africans arrived in Virginia - made her, for better or worse, the rarefied celebrity journalist. Then there is Nikole Hannah-Jones, whose The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story catapulted her to national prominence. Most journalists are faceless scribes, people whose work brings fleeting recognition or, if they are lucky, the pride that comes with knowing their work inspired some actual change.
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