UNC tenure struggle ends with Hannah-Jones on new course
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — A Black investigative journalist who won a Pulitzer Prize for her groundbreaking work on the bitter legacy of slavery in the U.S. announced Tuesday she will not join the faculty at the University of North Carolina following an extended tenure fight marked by allegations of racism and conservative backlash about her work.
Nikole Hannah-Jones will instead accept a chaired professorship at Howard University, a historically Black school in Washington, D.C.
The dispute over whether North Carolina’s flagship public university would grant Hannah-Jones a lifetime faculty appointment had prompted weeks of outcry from within and beyond its Chapel Hill campus. Numerous professors and alumni voiced frustration, and Black students and faculty questioned during protests whether the predominantly white university values them.
And while UNC belatedly offered her tenure last week, Hannah-Jones said in an interview with The Associated Press that the unfairness of how she was treated as a Black woman steered her toward turning the offer down.
“I wanted to send a powerful message, or what I hope to be a powerful message, that we’re often treated like we should be lucky that these institutions let us in,” said Hannah-Jones, who earned a master’s degree from UNC. “But we don’t have to go to those institutions if we don’t want to.”
Hannah-Jones — who won the Pulitzer Prize for her work on The New York Times Magazine’s 1619 Project focusing on America’s history of slavery — said she hadn’t sought out the job, and was recruited by UNC’s journalism dean before her tenure application stalled amid objections by a powerful donor and concerns by conservatives about her work.
The 45-year-old Hannah-Jones will instead accept a tenured position as the Knight Chair in Race and Journalism at Howard, which also announced Tuesday that award-winning journalist and author Ta-Nehisi Coates is joining its faculty. Coates, who won a National Book Award for “Between the World and Me,” and Hannah-Jones have both been given MacArthur “genius” grants for their writings.
Hannah-Jones’ tenure application was submitted to UNC’s trustees last year, but it was halted after a board member who vets the appointments raised questions about her nonacademic background. Instead, she was initially given a five-year contract, despite the fact that her predecessors were granted tenure when appointed. Last week the trustee board, after weeks of mounting pressure, finally voted to offer tenure.
UNC journalism school Dean Susan King, who supported Hannah-Jones throughout her application, said in a statement she hopes “that UNC can learn from this long tenure drama about how we must change as a community of scholars in order to grow.”
Hannah-Jones’ and Coates’ Howard appointments are supported by nearly $20 million donated by three philanthropic foundations and an anonymous donor, gifts meant to bolster Howard’s investment in Black journalists, the university said.
In her written statement, Hannah-Jones cited political interference and the influence of a powerful donor to the journalism school, a reference to Arkansas newspaper and Chattanooga Times Free Press publisher Walter Hussman. He has acknowledged in past interviews that he emailed university leaders challenging her work as “highly contentious and highly controversial.”
Hussman, whose name adorns the UNC journalism school after he pledged a $25 million donation, said in a statement Tuesday he did not lobby against Hannah-Jones.
“I offered to meet with Nikole Hannah-Jones two months ago, before the controversy ensued,” Hussman’s statement reads. “I wish we had been able to meet, and I would still like to meet and talk to her. I would have explained that since I expressed my concerns about the 1619 Project last year, I have not lobbied against her appointment. In fact, I have not talked to anyone on the board of trustees in months. I have not used my influence to determine who the school hires, as I realize that is the sole authority of the university. I certainly haven’t used any influence on the ideology of the school; in fact, I strongly believe a school of journalism should not have an ideology. Their job is to teach journalism, not ideology. I also do not think she tried to denigrate white Americans. I think all those individuals of different races who fought side by side to end slavery and champion civil rights should be celebrated for working together.”