Innovation OF THE MONTH

The Boston Globe’s Opinion team and Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research are collaborating to “resurrect and reimagine” The Emancipator, the first abolitionist newspaper in the nation, which was founded more than 200 years ago. According to its website (theemancipator.org), this project will amplify critical voices, ideas, and evidence-based opinion in an effort to accelerate racial justice.

The publication will also produce original opinion and ideas journalism, featuring contributions from experts and community voices captured by student journalists. The Emancipator will operate out of a hybrid newsroom set to launch later this year. Philanthropic funding will help ensure that content is free to the public.

Founding team members include Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, founding director of the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research; Bina Venkataraman, editorial page editor at the Globe; Kimberly

Atkins, Globe columnist and MSNBC contributor; and Dr. Monica Wang, associate director of narrative for the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research.

The project will also be supported by an advisory board of prominent leaders and thinkers, such as Nikole Hannahjones, New York Times Magazine reporter and 1619 Project creator, and Sewell Chan, editorial page editor for the Los Angeles Times.

“When The Emancipator was first founded in 1820, it was very difficult for people to believe that slavery, 45 years later, would be no more, just as I think there are many people today who can’t imagine that there could be a nation without racism and inequality,” Kendi said in the project’s announcement. “This reimagined platform will marry the best of scholarship and journalism to analyze, comment, and seek truth about the racial problems of our time.”—em