We have some big news to share.
This summer, our co-founder Ibram X. Kendi will be moving to Howard University to be a professor of history and build the Institute for Advanced Study, which will be dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of racism in the global African Diaspora. The institute will revolve around a competitive Residential Fellowship Program where an annual international class of fellows will pursue impactful projects across disciplines and fields.
The Center for Antiracist Research will close when its charter with Boston University expires on June 30. The Emancipator will be going to Howard with Dr. Kendi as part of the new institute.
There, our publication will continue the critical work to explore and explain solutions to racial inequity and injustice across the global African Diaspora, especially within the scope of pressing issues such as climate change and AI. The Emancipator will be part of the institute’s larger mission to enhance the general public’s understanding of racism and evidence-based antiracist solutions through academic and publicly accessible research, public lectures, events, workshops, and outreach programs.
We are hopeful that it will be invigorating for staff and audiences alike to have the publication based in “The Mecca,” a moniker that gives a nod to Howard’s reputation as a beacon of Black academic and artistic innovation, and an environment where Black leaders have long driven the conversation on racism and inequity.
If you’d like to support our publication, you may direct donations to the Howard Institute for Advanced Study here. (Please note in the comments of the giving page that you’d like to designate your gift to The Emancipator.)
As it heads to Howard later this year, The Emancipator will be primed to accept the challenge of this critical moment in our nation’s history in which the future of our democracy and a free press hangs in the balance.
The Emancipator was founded in 2021 to meet the moment. In the wake of George Floyd’s murder and the racial health disparities that the COVID crisis laid bare, two Boston institutions — the Boston Globe and Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research — co-founded and incubated a new publication that aimed to fill the void in mainstream media and to reimagine the first abolitionist newspapers for a new day, turning public opinion against racist policies and ideas with incisive reporting, commentary, and analysis.
We’ve spent these four years building out the go-to publication for anyone who wants to understand structural racism, how it impacts us all, and what we can do about it. In this time we’ve also managed transitions that helped our work to continue to grow. In 2023, we concluded our collaboration with the Globe and we transitioned to be fully housed under the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research. This move allowed us to operate and fundraise more nimbly as a nonprofit startup newsroom. In these two years at Boston University, we’ve grown our audience tremendously and we’ve been proud to be recognized for our award-winning journalism.
We are grateful for our time in Boston, where we were able to build so many impactful editorial and community partnerships. We’ve hosted some incredible community events, including the first-ever Racial Reporting Convening, a Juneteenth celebration of local artists, and book talks all around the city. We’ve published the work of some very talented student journalists at Boston University, Northeastern University, and several of the nation’s HBCUs — including Howard, and have benefited from their work on other projects and events. As a national publication, we hope to see The Emancipator continue to cultivate many more of these relationships and editorial partnerships across the greater Washington, D.C., area.
As it heads to Howard later this year, The Emancipator will be primed to accept the challenge of this critical moment in our nation’s history in which the future of our democracy and a free press hangs in the balance.
Thank you for your support. We look forward to keeping you informed on our transition.
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