The 1619 Project is a long-form journalistic historiographical work that takes a critical view of traditionally revered figures and events in American history, including the Patriots in the American Revolution and the Founding Fathers, along with Abraham Lincoln and the Union during the Civil War, as well as the development of America's economic, political, and social institutions. It was developed by Nikole Hannah-Jones, writers from The New York Times, and The New York Times Magazine. It focused on subjects of slavery and the founding of the United States, taking its name from the year that the first enslaved Africans arrived to colonial Virginia. The first publication from the project was in The New York Times Magazine of August 2019. The project developed an educational curriculum, supported by the Pulitzer Center, later accompanied by a broadsheet article, live events, and a podcast. "The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story" is a book-length anthology of essays and poetry that further develops the project's ideas.
The project has become a leading subject of the American history wars, receiving criticism from historians, both from the political left and the right, who question its historical accuracy. In a letter published in The New York Times in December 2019, historians Gordon S. Wood, James M. McPherson, Sean Wilentz, Victoria E. Bynum, and James Oakes applauded "all efforts to address the enduring centrality of slavery and racism to our history" and deemed the project a "praiseworthy and urgent public service," but expressed "strong reservations" about some "important aspects" of the project and requested factual corrections. These scholars denied the project's claim that slavery was essential to the beginning of the American Revolution. In response, Jake Silverstein, the editor of The New York Times Magazine, defended The 1619 Project and refused to issue corrections. On May 4, 2020, the Pulitzer Prize board announced that it was awarding the 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Commentary to Hannah-Jones for her introductory essay.
In March 2020, in light of persistent criticism of the project's portrayal of the role of slavery, including from one of its own consulting historians, Leslie M. Harris, The New York Times issued a "clarification", modifying one of the passages on slavery's role that had sparked controversy. In September 2020, controversy again arose when the Times updated the opening text of the project website to remove the phrase "...understanding 1619 as our true founding..." without any accompanying editorial note to point to what was being redone. Critics — including the Times own Bret Stephens — claimed the differences showed that the newspaper was backing away from some of the initiative's controversial claims. The Times defended its practices, with Hannah-Jones saying that most of the project's content had remained unchanged.
The project would be adapted into a podcast, book anthology, and children's book. In 2021 a partnership between the New York Times, Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Productions, and Lionsgate Films was made for the production of films, television programming, and other media based on the 1619 project. In January 2023, Hulu premiered a six-part documentary TV series, The 1619 Project, created by Hannah-Jones and The New York Times Magazine. This series won an Emmy for Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Series at the 75th Creative Arts Emmy Awards.
Background
The 1619 Project was launched in August 2019 to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first enslaved Africans in the British colony of Virginia. In 1619, a group of "twenty and odd" captive Africans arrived in the Virginia Colony. White Lion, an English privateer operating under a Dutch letter of marque, carried 20–30 Africans who had been captured in joint African-Portuguese raids against the Kingdom of Ndongo in modern-day Angola, making its landing at Point Comfort in the English colony of Virginia.
Although the project places this moment in the context of slavery in the colonial history of the United States, some critics have taken issue. The first enslaved Africans were brought to North America in 1526, and European enslavement of Native Americans has been documented as far back as Columbus in 1493–1494.
From 2011 to 2015 the New York Times ran a series of articles for the sesquicentennial of the American Civil War titled "Disunion", which released articles recounting what happened 150 years earlier on the same date, which was the group's first foray into historical essays.
In an interview with Colby College, Nikole Hannah-Jones said she first learned of the importance of the date 1619 after reading Lerone Bennett Jr.'s Before the Mayflower: A History of Black America, 1619–1962. Hannah-Jones stated in a discussion with Henry Louis Gates Jr. that while she had been considering a project based around black history for years, it was when she got into an argument on Twitter where she was told "Slavery was a long time ago. Why don’t you get over it?" that inspired her to develop the project to combat what she saw as a lack of knowledge on black history.
Project
The project dedicated an issue of the magazine to a re-examination of the legacy of slavery in America, at the anniversary of the 1619 arrival of the first enslaved people to the British colony of Virginia. This framing challenges the idea that American history began with the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, which created the United States, or with the arrival of the Pilgrims in 1620.
The project quickly grew into a larger endeavor, encompassing multiple issues of the magazine, with related materials in other Times publications, as well as a school curriculum developed in collaboration with the Pulitzer Center. With support from the Smithsonian, the project recruited a panel of historians to research, develop, and fact-check content. The project was envisioned with the condition that almost all of the content would be from African-American contributors, deeming the perspective of Black writers an essential element of the story to be told.
Nikole Hannah-Jones said in an interview with the Chicago Tribune that "If you read the whole project, I don't think you can come away from it without understanding the project is an argument for reparations".
August 18, 2019, magazine issue
The first edition appeared in a 100-page issue of The New York Times Magazine on August 18, 2019. It included ten written essays, a photo essay, and a collection of poems and fiction, with an introduction by editor-in-chief Jake Silverstein, as follows: "Our Democracy's Founding Ideals Were False When They Were Written. Black Americans Have Fought to Make Them True", essay by Nikole Hannah-Jones "American Capitalism Is Brutal. You Can Trace That to the Plantation", essay by Matthew Desmond "How False Beliefs in Physical Racial Difference Still Live in Medicine Today", essay by Linda Villarosa "What the Reactionary Politics of 2019 Owe to the Politics of Slavery", essay by Jamelle Bouie "Why Is Everyone Always Stealing Black Music?", essay by Wesley Morris "How Segregation Caused Your Traffic Jam", essay by Kevin M. Kruse "Why Doesn't America Have Universal Healthcare? One Word: Race", essay by Jeneen Interlandi "Why American Prisons Owe Their Cruelty to Slavery", essay by Bryan Stevenson "The Barbaric History of Sugar in America", essay by Khalil Gibran Muhammad "How America's Vast Racial Wealth Gap Grew: By Plunder", essay by Trymaine Lee "Their Ancestors Were Enslaved by Law. Now They're Lawyers", photo essay by Djeneba Aduayom, with text from Nikole Hannah-Jones and Wadzanai Mhute "A New Literary Timeline of African-American History", a collection of original poems and stories Clint Smith on the Middle Passage Yusef Komunyakaa on Crispus Attucks Eve L. Ewing on Phillis Wheatley Reginald Dwayne Betts on the Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 Barry Jenkins on Gabriel's Rebellion Jesmyn Ward on the Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves Tyehimba Jess on Black Seminoles Darryl Pinckney on the Emancipation Proclamation ZZ Packer on the New Orleans massacre of 1866 Yaa Gyasi on the Tuskegee syphilis experiment Jacqueline Woodson on Sgt. Isaac Woodard Joshua Bennett on the Black Panther Party Lynn Nottage on the birth of hip-hop Kiese Laymon on the Rev. Jesse Jackson's "rainbow coalition" speech Clint Smith on the Superdome after Hurricane Katrina
One of the claims made by Hannah-Jones was that the colonists fought the Revolutionary War to preserve slavery. The claim was later softened to say that "some of" the colonists fought to preserve slavery. The essays further discussed details of history as well as modern American society, such as traffic jams and the American affinity for sugar, and their connections to slavery and segregation. Matthew Desmond's essay argued that slavery had shaped modern capitalism and workplace norms. Jamelle Bouie's essay drew parallels between pro-slavery politics and the modern right-wing politics. Bouie argued that the United States still had not let go of the assumption that some people inherently deserved more power than others.
Accompanying material and activities
The magazine issue was accompanied by a special section in the Sunday newspaper, in partnership with the Smithsonian, examining the beginnings of the transatlantic slave trade, written by Mary Elliott and Jazmine Hughes. Beginning on August 20, a multi-episode audio series titled "1619" began, published by The Daily, the morning news podcast of the Times. The Sunday sports section had an essay about slavery's impact on professional sports in the United States: "Is Slavery's Legacy in the Power Dynamics of Sports?". The Times plans to take the project to schools, with the 1619 Project Curriculum developed in collaboration with the Pulitzer Center. Hundreds of thousands of extra copies of the magazine issue were printed for distribution to schools, museums and libraries.
The Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting has made available free online lesson plans, is collecting further lesson plans from teachers, and helps arrange for speakers to visit classes. The Center considers most of the lessons usable by all grades from elementary school through college. In 2026 the Pulitzer Center ran an exhibit with the DC Public Library inspired by the 1619 Project called "Freedom and Resistance" that included material submitted by student artists.
In November 2021, Random House's One World imprint published the anthology The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story. It is a book-length expansion of the project's essays. The book was created by Nikole Hannah-Jones and The New York Times Magazine, and is edited by Hannah-Jones, Caitlin Roper, Ilena Silverman and Jake Silverstein. Seven chapters were used for The 1619 Project: A Visual Experience, which combined them with newly commissioned art and archival material.
In 2021 it was announced that a partnership between The New York Times, Lionsgate Films, and Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Productions had been reached to develop the project into feature films, television series, podcasts, books, curriculums, and location-based exhibitions. The first offering of this partnership was the documentary miniseries, "The 1619 Project", in which six of the essays from A New Origin Story were adapted into six-episodes. The series premiered on January 26, 2023, on Hulu. In a 2022 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission Lionsgate said two feature films and two scripted television series based on the 1619 Project were in development, along with a multicity exhibition.
A children's picture book adaptation The 1619 Project: Born on the Water was released in 2021, the work was written by Hannah-Jones and Renée Watson and was illustrated by Nikkolas Smith. In 2026 a stage play adaptation of Born on the Water debuted at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library.
Reception