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Interview with Angie Thomas - Author of "The Hate U Give"

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Interview with Angie Thomas - Author of "The Hate U Give"

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n book publishing, it seems, they still do fairytales. Really not very long ago, Angie Thomas was a secretary to a bishop at a megachurch in Jackson, Mississippi. At nights - and during quiet periods in the day, she furtively admits - she worked on a young adult novel inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement. She had previously written a children's book, but hadn't had any interest from agents. "Yeah, I had more than 150 rejections for that one," says Thomas matter-of-factly. Thomas's break came when she cold-contacted a literary agent who was doing a Twitter Q&A. The story speeds up now: the novel became The Hate U Give (), a YA sensation about a 16-year-old girl called Starr who witnesses her friend Khalil being shot by the police and turns to activism. THUG, published in early 2017, went straight into the bestseller chart in the US and stayed there for a year. It was a hit here too, and named overall winner of the 2018 Waterstones children's book prize. It has now sold more than 2m copies globally. Last year, a film adaptation was released, which has been a critical and commercial success.

"Oh, it's definitely surreal," says the 31-year-old Thomas, on the phone from Jackson. "I still can't believe it. It does feel like a dream I'm going to wake up from." Her agent now is one of the 150-plus who turned down her first book. "So I hold that over his head," she says, and giggles.

Now Thomas is back with a follow-up, On the Come Up. Like THUG, it is set in Garden Heights, a fictional inner-city neighbourhood that is deprived and predominantly black. But while her debut was more issue-led, On the Come Up is perhaps more personal to Thomas. The book's protagonist, 16-year-old Bri, is obsessed with hip-hop - as Thomas herself is - and wants to make it as a rapper. When Bri's mother loses her job (as a secretary at a church, as it happens), and the family is faced with running out of food and then eviction, Bri has to fast-track her ambitions.

"When I started the book, I thought about what was the most traumatic thing in my life," says Thomas. "And fortunately for me, it wasn't losing a friend like Starr did, but unfortunately it was that experience of my mom losing her job and my family going into that crisis mode." Thomas was a teenager at the time, being home-schooled because she was experiencing mental health problems brought on by bullying. Her mother, who had been a teacher, oversaw Angie's education and looked after her own sick mother. "Yeah, it was a challenge," Thomas goes on. "We were living off the benefits my grandmother received and, even with that, there were days when we didn't know if we'd have enough food. So this book was definitely from my own experience."

Starr and Bri are both strong, independent characters, but they are also very different. "I compare Bri and Starr to Biggie and Tupac," laughs Thomas. "Without the beef! Tupac was very community-orientated, and that's how Starr is. But Bri, similar to Biggie, she's about making it, she's about seeing her dreams come to life. She's about trying to save her family, and there's nothing wrong with that. So that's where they're different, but they're similar in the fact that they are both powerful young women who know they have voices, and they both understand how they can use those voices to affect an entire generation."

Author Angie Thomas. Photograph: Imani Khayyam/The Observer

Thomas, meanwhile, has become a role model in her own right. The campaign We Need Diverse Books was started after a US study showed that, of the 3,200 children's books published in 2013, only 93 featured black people as the main character. The problem was further highlighted when American schoolgirl Marley Dias attempted to find 1,000 books where the protagonist was a black girl and failed. "When a 12-year-old kid calls you out, you need to change," says Thomas. "And I can see it slowly changing. There's been a shift within the past few months where more than half of the books on the New York Times bestseller list for young adults were by authors of colour featuring main characters of colour, and that's huge."

Thomas certainly knows what it's like to look at the publishing industry and find its walls impenetrable. "Rejection is always hard, and a lot of rejection is really hard," she says. "But what helped me was the community of unpublished authors out there on the internet, so you can connect and you can weep and mourn together. And I always had to remind myself that it only takes one yes to change everything. That's what I tell aspiring writers now. I know writers who had 500 rejections, and more than that - but you just have to keep going and hope that you do get that one yes."

Questions from famous fans

Frank Cottrell-Boyce
Screenwriter and novelist
A story for you - I took THUG with me on a long journey. Was saving the last chapter as a treat. The woman opposite me - as old as me, no way a young adult! - kept eyeing my copy, so I offered it to her while I got on with my work. When we arrived, she looked pleadingly at me. I said: "OK, you can keep it. I'll get another copy." She looked so relieved. She literally could not bring herself to put it down. I think one reason it has appealed to so many people is that despite its darkness, it's a very positive book, full of understanding. We don't do religion in the UK, but I wondered if your faith had played a part in that?
Angie Thomas First of all, that is a beautiful story. It always amazes me when I hear not just of people who connected with the book but people who are willing to share their own copy, because as a reader, I think I'd be too selfish. So thank you for being better than me! But yes, my faith is a huge part of who I am in every single thing that I do. It literally defines me. I tell people: "I love Jesus, but I cuss; thankfully he still loves me." And often, as a Christian, I find myself around people who are like, "Well, why would you want to address something like racism?" But the fact is, especially here in America, Sunday is the most segregated day of the week. And I think it's important for someone like me to speak up on this and to take a stand and hopefully to shed some light on the darkness.

On the Come Up and THUG take place in the same fictional neighbourhood of Garden Heights. Did you always intend on telling new stories from the same universe, and is it something you will do again?
I knew going in that I wanted to do another story in Garden Heights, at least one more, because it was important for me to show that even in a neighbourhood like that, you could have two young ladies whose lives are completely different, whose personalities are completely different. Black girls are already stereotyped so much and put into boxes so much, I never wanted anyone to assume that every single young lady in Garden Heights is like Starr or even like [her half-sister] Kenya. So now we have someone like Bri who is different from both of them. She's her own person. She has her own personality. She has her own struggle.

Someone recently asked me, did I think that Starr and Bri would get along? I think they would have their little clashes every now and then, but they would get along because both of them care deeply about others, and about their families and their community, and they can find common ground on that. It's just they have different approaches to address the things that affect them.

Nikesh Shukla
Author of most recently, The One Who Wrote Destiny, and co-editor of forthcoming The Good Immigrant USA

Give us your top five rappers and why (I think we can assume Tupac is No 1)...
I should have known he'd ask that question! But Lauryn Hill is one for sure. We don't give Lauryn Hill enough props or respect, not just as a woman in hip-hop but just as a talented individual in hip-hop. She's one of the best rappers of all time, and not enough people say that. Biggie for sure. As a Tupac fan, I'm sure people will be like, "How can you say that?" But you have to give respect where it's due: Biggie had the most amazing use of wordplay and his flow was iconic. Then I have to say Kendrick Lamar. He's new and everything, but I have to throw him in because he continues to be himself in an industry that often promotes being someone you're not. And my fifth one, it's either Jay-Z or André 3000, but I'm going to go with André 3000. As a southerner, Outkast was the group for me, and it was always amazing to see some rappers from the south who not only rapped well but they brought a lot of respect to us as a region when it comes to hip-hop. Usually with hip-hop it was always east coast versus west coast and the south was forgotten, but Outkast, they gave us a voice.
Author of My Name Is Leon and the editor of forthcoming Common People: An Anthology of Working Class Writers
Kit de Waal

Where do you see literature, particularly fiction, fitting in to acts of resistance?
If nothing else, fiction has empowered a lot of people in the act of resistance. The Hate U Give, I know, has birthed several young activists and I'm so happy with that, I'm so proud these young people have decided to speak up and speak out on things that concern them. There was one young lady in Texas, it started out with her deciding she was going to speak up for the book when it was challenged by the school district. And that led to her becoming an activist in her own right in other areas. So I think books can empower.

Rudine Sims Bishop [the author and educator] says that books are either mirrors, windows or sliding-glass doors, and that's important in the act of resistance. You need that mirror to see yourself, to know what you can be and know what you are. And then you need that window to see into someone else's life so you can understand what's happening around you in the world that you may not notice at first glance. And you need the sliding-glass door so that you can step into someone else's life and walk in with some empathy and use that empathy to make yourself heard. So yeah, I think books play a huge role in resistance. They play a huge role in opening people's eyes and they're a form of activism in their own right, in the fact that they do empower people and show others the lives of people who may not be like themselves.
Award-winning British YA author of Orangeboy
Patrice Lawrence

I have always known that there are black Americans, because US popular culture - from TV comedies and detective series to pop and hip-hop - have a prominent place in UK culture. Unfortunately, black British people rarely feature in the UK's cultural exports to the US. How do black Americans perceive their UK counterparts, and how can us UK lot boost our profile in the States?
First of all, I love Patrice. And it's interesting, because when I first came to the UK for my book tour in 2017, I told some of the kids back here in Mississippi that I was going, and they were like, "Wait, are there black people over there?" And I'm like, "Gosh! Black people are everywhere!" But the thing is, so often we don't know, we're not told about black people beyond America and Africa. And Americans in general, we tend to be very self-absorbed and don't hear about other communities beyond our own. So it's definitely something that we fail to do.

And, as for black British people to be more visible here in the States, I wish I had the answer. I would say one big thing I hope would happen though is that black British people would become more visible there in the UK. Cos I was talking to some black kids while I was there and they told me that they studied black history of America more than they've studied black history of the UK. And there is black history in the UK. So I think that should be changed, if nothing else.
Poet whose most recent collection is Don't Call Us Dead: Poems
Danez Smith

Is there such a thing as loving your characters for you? If so, how does a love for your characters, or the people they represent, inform how you put them through difficult situations?
I feel like the way I answer that is probably either going to make me seem cruel or heartless. I love Khalil in The Hate U Give and it was heartbreaking for me to do what I do to him. So when he lost his life the way that he did, it breaks my heart just as much as it breaks my readers' hearts. But the intention was that, even though it breaks their heart, maybe then they start thinking about the real-life Khalils, with that same love and empathy and sympathy. So it's definitely intentional for me to love my characters, even when I put them through stuff.

Jason Reynolds

Angie, one of the things writers, specifically writers of colour, often grapple with is the vaporous idea of authenticity, especially when it comes to voice. So, how do you balance writing a voice that feels culturally true without slipping into the clownishly trite?
For me, it's always about balance: being authentic without being over the top. Like slang: do I use slang every now and then? Absolutely. Will I overwhelm my reader with it and overwhelm my dialogue with it? No, absolutely not, because slang terms become outdated quickly, and also that's not how these kids speak. They are not overusing it. So for me, an authentic voice is all about listening to the people around me, listening to the world and listening to language patterns and seeing how people actually talk. And when I write my dialogue I usually say it out loud so I can see if it sounds OK. I find a lot of historic novels that portray the way black people spoke back in the day, they did it over-the-top and they had us sounding very ignorant. And why? Because they had no respect for us as people. So as a writer, my goal is to always have respect for whoever it is that I'm writing about or writing for.

Juno Dawson

You spent a lot of time on Twitter fielding questions about the casting of the film adaptation of The Hate U Give. Is social media, on balance, a blessing or a curse?
Ha! A little of both. It's a blessing because I get to connect with readers and I get to hear stories that I probably didn't hear before. I get to see pictures of kids in the hallways taken by their teachers and they're reading my book on their way to class, or I get to hear from parents who say, "This is the first book my kid has read in forever - thank you." Or I get to hear from the kids themselves who say, "Oh my God, I love this book." But then on the flipside you get the demands that sometimes readers make: "Why did you let them do this?" Or "Don't let them do this." I had to get to the point of recognising that I can't please everyone and I'm OK with that. My job is to simply write the book, tell the stories. The rest is beyond my control.

Amandla Stenberg as Starr in the film adaptation of The Hate U Give. Photograph: Erika Doss

Questions from readers

Did you have a eureka moment where you knew definitively that writing was what you wanted to do? What is your writing process?
Alomohbitters
My eureka moment came while I was writing soap-opera fan fiction! There was this soap opera here in the States called Passions and it was one of the most vacuous to ever exist; they had a witch on there and all these things. But the characters on that show were so rich and there was so much to be explored with them that, as a teenager, I decided to write fan fiction for them and put it up online. So my eureka moment came when I had readers say: "Wow, you're really good at this" or: "Girl, I rushed home when I saw that you had put up another chapter, I had to come home and read it." That really pushed me and I was like: "Wow, well, maybe this is something I can do with my own characters. Maybe I can create these worlds myself, that belong to me."

As for my process, I always try at least to write an outline chart. I don't always stick with the chart 100%, but it's at least a road map and if I make a couple of detours here and there that's OK. I took this from JK Rowling, actually. She did one for the fifth Harry Potter book and put it online: at the top of the chart, she had every character or subplot listed and then on the side she would have the different chapter numbers and that's how she could keep up with what was happening in every single chapter. So that's what I do for my books now. I do a chart. If it works for her, and she's sold all those books, maybe it can work for me!

NWA or Wu-Tang?
Paul Taylor, Dorset
Ohhhh, that's hard for me to answer that. Cos on the one hand, with NWA, they changed hip-hop as you know it - you've got an entire genre of hip-hop and, really, a coast in hip‑hop culture because of NWA. They helped bring west coast hip-hop to popularity. They gave us gangsta rap, but then on the other hand... they gave us gangsta rap. They gave us music that at times demeaned women, they gave us music that at times was destructive for the community when people took it the wrong way or used it a certain way. So it's hard for me to say NWA. I do appreciate anything that they did, but I have to go with Wu-Tang.

Do you see yourself as a political writer or a writer who happens to be political? How do you think Trump's presidency is changing America and what mark do you think it will leave, especially on literature, when he goes?
Gaverne Bennett, London
These days, it's hard to say because politics is such a huge part of my life anyway. But I would say that I'm a writer who is concerned about politics. I would never just say that I only write about social justice issues, because I won't. It's funny, because I tell people: "Mississippi is known for two things: writing and racism." And I happen to be a writer who writes about racism.

For the second part, if nothing else right now, Trump has stained America. He has taken us out of a leadership position in the world. Nobody will listen to us now as a leader or as a beacon of hope for anything because of him and because of his actions and because of the decisions he makes. But I will say, I'm more hopeful now than I was before, because I'm seeing more people who are concerned about politics. We're going to come away from this knowing that we have the ability to change things and that ultimately our government answers to us. So I hope that by the end, when he's out of office, that the world will know that we Americans, the majority of us, don't stand for what he stands for. So definitely, please don't give up on us.

Learning to read and write is "freedom" only if one can find a publisher with contacts for publicity. Eudora Welty, whose writings I adore, got hers through the New Deal programmes. How did you find yours?
Shrimpandgrits
Wow, that's awesome that he or she loves Eudora. My college that I attended is actually across the street from her house, so I would see that every single day. But, for me, my publishing journey actually started with Twitter, of all things. When I was writing The Hate U Give, I was honestly not sure if it was something that would even be published, because if you said Black Lives Matter to 30 different people you may get 30 different responses. But also because publishing, young-adult publishing was so white, I wasn't used to seeing books about black girls and I definitely wasn't seeing books about black girls in situations like this.

So a literary agency held a question-and-answer session on Twitter and I went on and I asked a question. I'm paraphrasing but basically I asked: "Is a book that addresses an issue like this even something that can be published?" And a literary agent by the name of Brooks Sherman responded: "I don't think any topic is off limits for young adult readership. It's just a matter of how you address it." And I was like: "Well, I hope I address it well." And he said: "I'd actually like to read it if that's OK." So I sent it to him and a few months later he signed me as a client. A few months after that, he submitted it to publishers and 13 US publishers fought for the rights to the book. So Twitter is good for something; if nothing else, it found me an agent.

Do you think the world should focus so much on the cultural problems of the US, when really it's just 3% of the population?
GreenlandGyr falcon
No, I don't think that they should. That's a great point. We should not be the centre of attention all the time. I see why [we are], because we are such a powerhouse, but we need to be aware of other countries and what's happening there. It doesn't make sense that you guys have to be subjected to our news maybe sometimes more than your own. So I am so sorry on behalf of America. I am so sorry that our stuff takes up so much air space. I am so sorry that we take up so many headlines.

What advice would you give to your younger self?
Molly Reed, aged 15, Barnes, London
I would tell my younger self to be yourself no matter where you are. In a few years, you're going to be entering university and you are going to ask questions if you're being your authentic self because you're often made to feel you're either too much or not enough. But I promise you, you are enough. You're enough for everywhere you go, for whatever you do. Always know that. And then I would tell my younger self, my 15-year-old self specifically, if you want to write, write for yourself. Whatever it is that you want to do, do it for yourself. Don't do it for the accolades, do it because it's something you love. And then I would tell my 15-year-old self: it's going to be OK. There are days where you wonder if that's true, how you're going to survive all of this stuff. You wonder, will you make it? You just have to hang in there, you have to keep going and if you keep going, I promise you there will be light in the darkness. You can do it!

Aww, you made me tear up!

On the Come Up (Walker Books, £7.99) by Angie Thomas is out 7 February. To order a copy for £7.03 go to guardianbookshop.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £15, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99

Angie Thomas: On the Come Up is at the Southbank Centre, London, Tuesday 12 March, 7pm. Tickets (£15) from southbankcentre.co.uk

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Angie Thomas, author of The Hate U Give: 'Books play a huge part in resistance'

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The author's young adult novel became a publishing sensation and an acclaimed film. Here, she answers questions from readers and famous fans on activism, social media and coping with rejection

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Brene Brown Ted Talk: The Power of Vulnerability 

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Brene Brown Ted Talk: The Power of Vulnerability 

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The Power of Vulnerability | Brené Brown | TED

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Follow the leader | Suli Breaks | TEDxHousesofParliament

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there comes a time when you stop hoping for
One American Hero
and realize there is only you - picking
trash from the neighbor's yard,
hauling jars to the recycle bin,
calling your great-aunt
Susan even though
she is not just your aunt Susan and
this is not just your godforsaken earth.

It is depressing to know a war is coming.
Worse to know the war will always be in you.

Little cauldron, little tender loon.
Take comfort in your bold heart
where hope and fear are mingling.
Kate Baer is the author of two bestselling books of poems. Her forthcoming poetry collection, "And Yet," will be published Nov. 8. @katejbaer

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Little cauldron, little tender loon. Take comfort in your bold heart...

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Christian Paige | What Does it Mean to Lead? | Spoken Word Poetry

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Today, everyone's eyes
Are on us as we rise.
Today is the day women
Are paving the way,
Speaking our truth to power.
In this hour, it is our duty
to find the brave beauty
In rooting for other women
So they too know we are not victims,
We are victors, the greatest predictors
of progress. We press for change,
A new dawn drawn into the open
By women whose silence is broken.
We push on and act on
Our responsibility to bring visibility
To the most vulnerable:
To bring freedom to those who didn't have a choice,
To bring volume to those who are using their voice.
We clear a woman's way,
We don't fear the day
She steps into the light
Because we are with her
Every step of the fight.
There's a lot at stake, but making
A difference always takes great courage.
So we encourage women who dare to stare
Fear square in its face,
Women who've always shown
That when one woman stands up
She is never alone.
We know that when she steps up to right a wrong,
She will fight to bring others along
To the network, into the conversation,
Working together to change communities
And nations for generations, our world
Made all the stronger the longer
Women are able to sit at the table.
It is her strength, her story, and her spirit
Which inspires other vital voices
to speak up when they hear it.
So let it be said that light will be shed
When our world is led by leaders ahead
of the headlines, the voices
Who are first on the frontline,
These women who stand up,
knowing the wind
Not by where it is, but where it is blowing,
Leading worlds not by how society is
But where change is going.
We all leap forward when one woman tries,
When she defies with her rallying cries.
Here lies, but does not rest, the best
Of tested women who call us all to rise,
Speaking the truth in this finest hour:
That to their own power,
every single woman is entitled.
But it's how they empower others
That makes women's voices so vital.

Last updated March 20, 2023

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Today, everyone's eyes Are on us as we rise. Today is the day women Are paving the way, Speaking our truth to power. In this hour, it is our duty to find the brave beauty In rooting for other women So they too know we are not victims, We are victors, the greatest predictors of progress.

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Xiuhtezcatl Martinez on Climate Activism 

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Xiuhtezcatl Martinez on Climate Activism 

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Campaign Video 

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Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Campaign Video 

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The Courage to Change | Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

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Lakshman Rohith Maradapa - IOC Young Leaders 

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Lakshman Rohith Maradapa - IOC Young Leaders 

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Meet the IOC Young Leaders – Lakshman Rohith Maradapa from India

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Rana Abdelhamid vividly remembers the day in 2010 when, as a 16 year old walking in New York City, a man physically attacked her and tried to remove her hijab.

"I turned around and saw what hate looked like in someone's eyes," she recalls.

Rana grew up in a diverse neighborhood in Queens, New York. Her parents, Abdelrazek Abdelhamid and Mona Elboghdadi, had immigrated from Egypt.

"We decided to come to the United States because I was looking for a better life for our kids," says her father.

But Rana remembers how negative her peers' attitudes became after 9/11.

"Before 9/11, my identity as a Muslim woman in Queens was very religious," she says. "After 9/11, my identity became very politicized."

Just months after her assault in 2010, Rana founded International Muslim Women's Initiative for Self-Empowerment ((IM)WISE) with 12 female peers. The organization's mission is to teach self-defense and entrepreneurial and leadership skills to young Muslim women.

"I saw a need in my community," she says. "I wanted to create a safe space where young adolescent girls could learn to feel empowered by learning basic self-defense skills and by engaging in dialogue."

Rana and (IM)WISE were featured in Elle Magazine.

(IM)WISE continued to grow after Rana was selected as a Posse Scholar and left New York for Middlebury College in Vermont. Her Posse support network-which included Posse staff, members of her cohort and faculty mentors-enabled her to thrive on campus.

"Posse gave her a community and a stronger sense of self to pursue her dreams," says Lily Ghebrai, a fellow Middlebury alumna.

Rana studied international politics and helped establish Middlebury's Amnesty International chapter. She became a fellow at the school's Center for Social Entrepreneurship, where Professor John Isham worked with her to develop a new curriculum for (IM)WISE.

Rana credits these experiences, as well as Posse's Pre-Collegiate Training (PCT), with helping her to build the necessary skills to take her ideas out into the world.

"Posse is a remarkable model for social change."

"The opportunity and the support you get through Posse, it's just a remarkable model for social change," says Rana.

She was awarded the Harry S. Truman Scholarship as a senior in 2014, which gave her financial support to further develop (IM)WISE.

Over the past eight years, Rana and her team have expanded (IM)WISE nationally and internationally, running programs in Texas, New Jersey, and D.C. and in cities in Scotland, Ireland and Spain.

Rana Abdelhamid (center) with UN Commissioner Justice Michael Kirby and UNA-USA Executive Director Chris Whatley at the UN Foundation's 2014 Global Leadership Awards, where she was honored.

Rana credits her family for her emotional grounding, saying that her father taught her to act with kindness and her mother taught her empathy.

"She really understands the importance of listening, and finding ways to build connections between communities," says Dr. Karen Jackson Weaver, dean at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, where Rana is currently pursuing a master's degree in public policy.

In addition to her work with (IM)WISE and as a graduate student, Rana is a human rights organizer with Amnesty International and conducts research on the inclusion of Muslim minority communities.

Rana plans for (IM)WISE to continue to spread internationally, giving Muslim women around the world opportunities to become leaders.

"Being able to extend this mission has been really empowering on a personal level," Rana says. "It has also has shown me that, regardless of how young you are, or what your gender is, your sexuality, your race or ethnic background, you can have an impact."

Watch: Rana's Posse Star Tribute Video

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nonprofit founder empowers muslim women with self-defense training

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Nonprofit founder empowers Muslim women with self-defense training | The Posse Foundation

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Posse and its partner institutions empower diverse groups of leaders who transform communities, this country and the world.

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Abby Wambach - On The New Rules of Leadership

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Abby Wambach - On The New Rules of Leadership

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Brené with Abby Wambach on the New Rules of Leadership

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In this episode, I connect with Olympian, activist, and author Abby Wambach on the new rules of leadership. Her book, WOLFPACK, is leadership gold.

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Megan Rapinoe thrives on noise. Most athletes strive to be "in the zone"-that state of quiet mental focus enabling players to block out the cheers and jeers of stadium crowds, allowing performance to peak. Rapinoe, however, takes in all the chatter. "I'm hearing the crowds, I'm hearing the fans," she says. The two-time defending World Cup champion forward for the U.S. is reclining on a restaurant couch in Seattle, where she plays for the OL Reign of the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL), wearing rhinestone-studded jeans and a tricolored shirt-white, red, and black-with a flower pattern running down the sleeves. "Every time I go over for a corner kick," says Rapinoe, "I'm always like, 'Hey, what's going on here?'"
Buy a print of the Megan Rapinoe cover here
Rapinoe's embrace of commotion has defined her career. She's one of the most talked-about American athletes of our time, a 5-ft. 7-in. whirling dervish of resistance who, depending on whom you ask, is either an unapologetic symbol of on-field excellence and off-field progress or a disrespectful heel. (Or, if misogyny or homophobia is your bag, worse.) More than a decade ago, she came out as gay, giving many other female sports figures permission to be more open about their sexuality. She has since worked tirelessly as an advocate for the LGBTQ+ community-she's the brightest athletic star currently leading a fight against the proliferation of U.S. state laws that ban transgender youth from playing on teams consistent with their gender identity. Rapinoe has also knelt in solidarity with Colin Kaepernick and led a protracted but ultimately successful battle against her own soccer federation to ensure equal pay for female players. After Donald Trump criticized her during the 2019 World Cup, she scored against France and struck a now iconic pose that reminded the then President, and her vociferous critics, that she's going absolutely nowhere.

Last year, Joe Biden awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the country's highest civilian honor. She's the first soccer player so recognized.

Read More: What to Know About the U.S. Soccer Team in the 2023 Women's World Cup

Rapinoe is entering her fourth and final World Cup, which kicks off July 20 in the dual host nations of Australia and New Zealand and promises to be the best-attended and most-viewed women's sporting event in history. She announced on July 8 that she will retire at the end of the 2023 NWSL season. Rapinoe will likely play a more muted on-field role, as a reserve and veteran mentor for younger players on the U.S. team, which is seeking to make history as the first squad, women's or men's, to win three consecutive World Cup titles. Injuries to several prominent U.S. players, however, could call Rapinoe, who turned 38 in early July, into action. A repeat of her brilliant 2019 performance is unlikely, but no longer impossible.

No matter how Rapinoe fares at the tournament, she's secured her place as one of the world's most influential athletes. Her creative and joyful play helped elevate women's soccer to the status of appointment viewing. Female players around the world have followed the example of Rapinoe and her teammates and waged pay fights against their federations. She created a blueprint for female athletes: Tap into your truest self and demand what's yours. Lay waste to the notion of being agreeable.

"In the past, a lot of female athletes-in our generation, for sure-were told to sit down, to be quiet, to be grateful," says former U.S. soccer player Julie Foudy, one of the stars of the 1999 World Cup-winning national team, whose victory helped bring women's sports into the consciousness of many fans. "What Rapinoe has brought to the equation is the idea of we're going to have to boldly disrupt. History has shown that women like her lead people over that line. She hasn't given a rat's ass what people think. This is who she is, and what she does. There's freedom to that."

From her earliest days, Rapinoe was a tempestuous force. She grew up in Redding, Calif., a remote pocket of red in deep-blue California some 140 miles north of Sacramento. Her father Jim worked as a building contractor; her mother Denise was a waitress at Jack's Grill, a local steak house, for 36 years; she retired on June 30. "When she was convinced she needed something, and my parents wouldn't give it to her, she would hold her breath until she passed out," says her twin sister Rachael. On Megan's left hand is a tattoo reading "Mammers"-a nickname for Denise. Her right-hand ink reads "Ma Barker"-a nickname her grandfather gave her, much to her mother's chagrin, after the matriarch of a criminal gang, because of her tantrums.
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Her parents would shuttle the girls five hours, round trip, to travel to team practices in the Sacramento area. They both received athletic scholarships to the University of Portland and won a national championship. From Megan's initial tours with the national team, her approach stood out. In one training session, she crossed the ball behind her plant leg, a bit of fancy footwork that earned her a reprimand from one of her veteran teammates. Keep it simple, the vet said. After practice, however, Rapinoe insisted to Abby Wambach -the all-time leading goal scorer in U.S. history-that she made the perfect play. "She's not wrong," says Wambach. "Megan is always trying to creatively figure out what's the best way, the most fun way, to get the job done."

Read More: Your Guide to the 2023 Women's World Cup

At the 2011 World Cup, Rapinoe's cross to Wambach, this time in front of her plant leg, as per tradition, late in a quarter-final game against Brazil kept America's chances alive. (The U.S. ultimately lost to Japan in the final.) At the London Olympics the next year, where the U.S. won gold, Rapinoe scored two goals in an epic 4-3 semifinal victory over Canada, including a goal scored directly off a corner kick, known as an "Olimpico" in soccer circles. She was the first to notch an Olimpico at the Olympics.

Rapinoe played a key role in the 2015 U.S. World Cup win in Canada, the country's first title since 1999. But her career came to a crossroads a year later when she became the first white professional athlete to kneel during the national anthem. "It felt like this is what Colin was asking for," Rapinoe says. To this day, Rapinoe believes that if white NFL players, especially fellow quarterbacks like Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers, had knelt to support Kaepernick, he'd still be playing. "Everything looks different, 100%," she says.

The blowback was immediate, violent, and visceral, Rachael recalls. Rapinoe received death threats. Jack's management took down a montage of her photos behind the bar. Patrons sought out Denise to voice their displeasure. "Men can be really abrasive about it," says Denise. One guy told her, "We love you. But I just wish Megan was different." Denise replied, "Megan is just perfect the way she is." The man grew angry and grabbed Denise's arm before his wife and another couple settled him down.

After Rapinoe knelt before a national-team game vs. Thailand, U.S. Soccer put out a statement tsk-tsking her without naming names: "We have an expectation that our players and coaches will stand and honor our flag while the national anthem is played." At the next game, the crowd in Atlanta booed her when she entered as a second-half sub. She was told not to dress for the two games that followed. According to Rapinoe, coach Jill Ellis blamed the benching on her fitness. In early 2017, Rapinoe was left off the roster for the annual SheBelieves Cup held in the U.S. "No one is going to say this," says Rapinoe, "but I feel like they were happy to just let me go out to pasture." (U.S. Soccer declined to comment.)

Around this time, Rapinoe started dating WNBA star Sue Bird, now her fiancée. Bird is five years Rapinoe's senior, and diligent in her nutrition and training habits. These weren't Rapinoe's strengths. During her national-team exile, Rapinoe started following Bird's regimen. "The silver lining was, she had a big chunk of time to really work on her soccer self and get into peak shape," says Bird, who retired at the end of the 2022 WNBA season, at 41, and whose Seattle Storm jersey now hangs in the rafters. "She came back and balled out."

During the 2019 World Cup, the soccer publication Eight by Eight released a video from earlier that year of Rapinoe saying that if the U.S. team won the title, she wouldn't go "to the f-cking White House." Trump retaliated with a tweetstorm questioning Rapinoe's patriotism and imploring her to "WIN first before she TALKS."

Rapinoe's remarks sparked a fresh wave of hate. Even Bird's sister received an ominous text message demanding she instruct Bird to "tell her girlfriend to shut the f-ck up." In the team's next game, a quarter-final clash in Paris against France, Rapinoe opened the scoring on a gorgeous free kick: she jogged to the corner, extended both arms while staring up into the screaming crowd, and flashed a-her words-"sh-t-eating grin." Trump was on the brain. "If I could have done this ..." she says with a laugh, mimicking the celebration, and extending a middle finger. "Could you just imagine?"

Read More: These Are the Non-USWNT Players to Watch at This Women's World Cup

To Rapinoe, who would win the Golden Ball as the tournament's best player, the gesture also carried a deeper message. "You can't stop progress," she says. "No matter how hard you try. Out of nowhere, this freakin' purple-haired lesbian is going to come in and be like, F-ck you."

Rapinoe's pet theory is that Trump is secretly a fan. "You know he was watching that game," she says. "You know he had his McDonald's lined up. And he was probably like, 'You know what, I love that.' I always felt Trump loved me." Rapinoe insists-and a U.S. Soccer official confirms-the Trump White House back-channeled an invite, which the team declined. (Spokespeople for the Trump 2024 campaign did not return a request for comment.)

In fact, Rapinoe is convinced she has fewer haters than most people think. "I'm exactly what they're familiar and comfortable with, just packaged up differently," Rapinoe says. "But I'm exactly the brash, arrogant athlete that Americans love."

After winning a second straight World Cup, Rapinoe and her teammates turned their attention to another goal: establishing equal pay with the men. The players had filed a gender-discrimination lawsuit against U.S. Soccer before the World Cup, and America's victory galvanized a movement. Chants of "Equal pay! Equal pay!" filled the Stade de Lyon after the team knocked off the Netherlands in the final. After a ticker-tape parade in New York City, Rapinoe endorsed then U.S. Soccer president Carlos Cordeiro near the steps of City Hall. "I think he's going to make things right," she said. Thousands of fans, who minutes before had jeered Cordeiro as he spoke, screamed their approval. At that moment, Rapinoe could have persuaded that crowd to vote for Trump, if she wanted. Hell, she could have run for President herself. She was the most famous woman in America.

Which made it so surprising that Cordeiro mispronounced her name. In his own speech that day, he called her RAP-in-o instead of the proper Ra- PINO. "Carlos had the biggest bag fumble of all time," Rapinoe says now. "Just cringey." This mishap turned out to be minor compared with what was to come. In March 2020, U.S. Soccer filed a brief arguing against equal pay on the basis of men being stronger, faster, and bearing "more responsibility" in their roles. Yes, U.S. Soccer launched a defense-in a gender-discrimination suit-that came across as quite sexist. "I remember being gobsmacked," says Rapinoe. "You cannot possibly be this dumb. Thank you for that. Because this is not going to play well." The federation's sponsors flipped out, and Cordeiro resigned a day later. (Cordeiro, now senior adviser to the FIFA president, declined to comment.)

Still, on May 1, the women faced a legal setback: a U.S. district judge in California rejected the argument that the women were underpaid relative to the men. Rapinoe, however, swears she still believed the team would prevail. "Our lack of real depth of understanding of the legal system was probably our greatest tool," she says. "The normal mentality of athletes is, 'OK, you lose, what's next?' It never seemed over."

She called it correctly. A little more than two years after that decision, U.S. Soccer and the players' associations for the men's and women's teams announced a historic collective-bargaining agreement that will run through 2028. The women and men would receive identical compensation for national-team competitions, while also splitting FIFA World Cup prize money equally, becoming the first federation to do so. Although it was a team effort, Rapinoe's voice had been out front. "She's demanded that women's sports no longer be treated as a sideshow to men's sports," says Senator Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat. "It echoes everywhere. When Megan stood up and exposed what was going on in women's soccer with unequal pay, she told 13-year-old girls all around the world that they didn't have to accept second-class citizenship."

Lydia Sheeser would know. She began her freshman year of high school soon after the U.S. women won in 2019. That fall, inspired by Rapinoe and the team, four of Sheeser's teammates on the Burlington High School girls' soccer team removed their jerseys after a goal to reveal the #EqualPay shirts they were wearing underneath. All four of them received yellow cards. The team then raised more than $100,000 selling shirts and worked with a Vermont nonprofit to distribute funds for scholarships and sports access for girls from underserved communities. Sheeser will attend Lehigh University in the fall, on a scholarship for students advancing gender equity. "Megan Rapinoe has completely changed my life," she says. "The lessons of self-advocacy I have learned through this movement are going to be a huge tool."

Rapinoe has shared that toolbox with the world. Since the U.S. team first filed an EEOC complaint against its federation in 2016, a host of women's national teams-including those of Norway, New Zealand, Brazil, Australia, England, Ireland, Spain, Israel, and the Netherlands-have signed equal-pay agreements. Canada's women's team inked an interim deal this year while its players continue to fight for equal pay in a new collective-bargaining agreement. "There's been no national team in the world that has really believed they deserve equality before everything that happened in the U.S.," says Karin Sendel, chairman of the Israel Football Players Organization. "And then there's this domino. You need a leader like Megan."

With equal pay on the books, Rapinoe has shifted her focus to trans-rights advocacy. She's particularly contemptuous of policies designed to keep transgender girls and women from playing on female sports teams. "We as a country are trying to legislate away people's full humanity," she says. Proponents of such laws often claim they're protecting women's sports. "It's particularly frustrating when women's sports is weaponized," she says. "Oh, now we care about fairness? Now we care about women's sports? That's total bullsh-t. And show me all the trans people who are nefariously taking advantage of being trans in sports. It's just not happening."

To Rapinoe, the benefits of allowing trans kids to play outweigh any supposed costs. "The most amazing thing about sports is that you play and you're playing with other people, and you're having fun and you're being physically active," she says. "We're putting this all through the lens of competition and winning. But we're talking about people's lives. That's where we have to start."

Rapinoe believes that questioning transgender participation in women's sports, as Martina Navratilova and ESPN anchor Sage Steele have done, does harm that reaches far beyond the athletic field. "I don't want to mince words about it," she says. "Dave Chappelle making jokes about trans people directly leads to violence, whether it's verbal or otherwise, against trans people. When Martina or Sage or whoever are talking about this, people aren't hearing it just in the context of elite sports. They're saying, 'The rest of my life, this is how I'm going to treat trans people.'"

Would Rapinoe embrace a transgender woman on the U.S. women's soccer team, even if that woman took the place of someone assigned female at birth? "Absolutely," she says. "'You're taking a "real" woman's place,' that's the part of the argument that's still extremely transphobic. I see trans women as real women. What you're saying automatically in the argument-you're sort of telling on yourself already-is you don't believe these people are women. Therefore, they're taking the other spot. I don't feel that way."

The night before Rapinoe and I met in Seattle, U.S. forward Mallory Swanson, the national team's leading goal scorer this year, tore her left patella tendon. She'd be out for the World Cup. "Horrible," Rapinoe says as we sit down. While she expresses sincere sympathy for Swanson, she admits her competitive instincts kicked in. "I'm not gonna be like, 'Oh, I haven't thought about it,'" says Rapinoe. "Her minutes are going to have to go somewhere." Rapinoe will likely get more time off the bench, especially if the U.S. needs a second-half spark. "There's nobody better with the ball at their feet than Megan Rapinoe," says Fox Sports studio analyst Alexi Lalas.

The team is entering a period of transition. Veteran stars like Rapinoe and Alex Morgan will still contribute. But if the U.S. is going to secure the three-peat, a new crop of talent-featuring World Cup rookies like Lynn Williams, Sophia Smith, and Trinity Rodman-will have to step up. Experienced players like Swanson, Becky Sauerbrunn, and Sam Mewis can't play because they're hurt. Rapinoe and Rose Lavelle have dealt with nagging injuries in the World Cup run-up.

"There's just a lot of question marks," says former U.S. star Carli Lloyd, who'll be working for Fox Sports during this World Cup. "If a player is not really fit and healthy right now, it's going to be really hard. Because when that whistle blows in a World Cup, it's not like friendly games. Opposing players are sharp, they're ready."

The global growth of women's soccer will act as another obstacle to a three-peat. Australia's Sam Kerr, for example, is a lethal scorer and will enjoy home-field advantage. France and Brazil are hungry to win their first titles. Last year's European Championship, hosted by England, set all kinds of attendance and viewership records. England beat Germany, 2-1, in a thrilling final in front of 87,192 fans at Wembley Stadium. "They got their little taste of winning," says Rapinoe. "I was like, 'Dammit.' It was like a page out of our playbook. Well played. And you're welcome." The U.S. defeated England in the 2019 World Cup semi: Morgan memorably mimicked sipping tea after scoring, setting off a bit of a row. "Yeah, I would imagine if we meet each other again this time, there will be a healthy amount of, if not explicit, then implicit, trash talking," says Rapinoe. "For sure."

The specifics of Rapinoe's post-World Cup, post-soccer plans are less certain. She's already started a production company, called A Touch More, with Bird that "centers stories of revolutionaries who move culture forward." Despite her political engagement, she says she'll never run for office. She talks about being a "mogul for women's sports, a mogul for good."

Whatever she does, don't expect her to fade away. Even after she hangs up her spikes, Rapinoe, the bold, loud changemaker who lives for the big moments, will still seek out the noise. "I have this incredible privilege and platform and hope that I can turn that into rocket fuel for the next phase of everything," she says. "I want to make the world a better place. And I will pull that lever slowly, relentlessly, and ruthlessly, forever."
Styled by Alvin Stillwell; hair and make-up by Kaija Towner
Write to Sean Gregory at sean.gregory@time.com.

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U.S. Soccer star Megan Rapinoe, who will retire after the 2023 NWSL season, is entering her fourth and final World Cup.

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When we consume art-get swept up in a film, meander through a museum, parse the lines of a poem-we tend to direct our praise or criticism toward the artist who created the work. But behind every artist, there is almost always a person, and sometimes many more than one, who believed in their vision and gave them an opportunity to share their work with the world.

It may be a gallerist who took a chance on a painter whose work they knew would upend the norms of the art world and prove a tough sell to buyers. It may be a publisher who releases into the world books with the power to reframe how we think about our common history, or an editor who breathes new life into the work of a German playwright by having it translated for the first time for English-speaking readers. It may be an executive who deems a television series undeniably binge-worthy.

The art that reaches our eyes and ears does not find its way there by accident. Here, TIME highlights the work of 12 champions of culture who are creating platforms-be they museum walls or magazine pages or literal stages-for the artists who are opening our minds and changing our world today.

Jack Shainman

Founder and Owner of Jack Shainman Gallery

Even as a kid growing up in Williamstown, Mass., Jack Shainman was honing his eye for great art. The son of a music professor, he was a regular at nearby museums like the Clark Art Institute, and he cut his teeth on collecting by buying work from local art students. Now, 30 years into his career as a gallery owner, Shainman is responsible for helping to cultivate some of the most significant names in contemporary art today, from painter Kerry James Marshall to photographer and multimedia artist Carrie Mae Weems to Ghanaian sculptor El Anatsui. Through the decades, one thing has remained constant: his passion for finding an audience for underseen visionaries.

To be a good gallery owner, Shainman says, you have to be fully committed to the artists you represent. "When you show something in the gallery, you have to be ready to defend it-not everybody comes in and loves everything all the time." This was certainly the case when he opened his first New York City gallery with his late partner Claude Simard, in 1986. Shainman held fast to representing creators whose work he truly believed was worthy, rather than catering to the tastes of the industry. But it wasn't exactly a recipe for quick success. Several of the artists Shainman represented were people of color, and thanks to the underlying currents of racism in the art world-a problem that's far from solved today-he struggled to get his roster of artists included in major art fairs and often met with reluctant clients. After Marshall's first show with Shainman in 1993 wrapped up with a few unsold paintings, Shainman remembers the painter telling him, "I just don't think people are ready to have pictures of black people in their living rooms."

Things have changed since then-last year, a painting of Marshall's sold for $21.1 million to the mogul Sean Combs-but for Shainman, who now has two galleries in New York and a 30,000-sq.-ft. exhibition space upstate, his motivation remains the same. While he's proud that his gallery is known for its diverse roster of artists, he says that's simply a by-product of his approach. "It happened organically," he says, "just by being open to new things and for the love of the work."

Chris Jackson

Publisher and editor in chief of One World, a Penguin Random House imprint

Chris Jackson publishes books. But what moves him most can't be found within their pages. More than anything, the publisher and editor in chief of the imprint One World is moved when he sees the work his books do to bring people together.

Take civil rights attorney Bryan Stevenson's 2014 book Just Mercy, which Jackson edited. Last year, during the inaugural weekend of the national lynching memorial Stevenson's Equal Justice Initiative built, Jackson saw visitors carrying Just Mercy as a kind of guiding text. "The book was the platform Bryan used to extend his work in ways that are transforming our communal memory in this country," Jackson says.

Jackson has pursued these kinds of stories for years, during his decade as executive editor at Spiegel & Grau and now as head of One World, which he took over in 2017. One World was founded to highlight African-American stories in the 1990s when the publishing world was trying to diversify its ranks. But the imprint was siloed and struggled to maintain the broader industry's interest, Jackson says. Since taking the helm, he has sought to institutionalize a pipeline for new voices that are upending traditional narratives.

But his goal is not to acquire any book by a writer from a marginalized background for diversity's sake alone. "The idea that the imprint is committed to diversity is kind of absurd," Jackson says. "We want to reflect the world we live in." The imprint allows writers to tell subversive stories in an authentic way, without what he calls "white filtering," or couching stories in ways that feel comfortable or familiar to white readers.

Jackson grew up seeing poverty and violence in Harlem but also witnessing privilege at Hunter College High School and then Columbia University-experiences that left him searching for his place and often finding answers in books. "The story of survival but also the story of trying to find a better way is the burden of everyone who grows up black in America," Jackson says. "You think a lot about: How do we survive? How do we learn how to take care of each other better? How do we imagine a better future? And I think that's something I'm able to bring to every kind of project."

While it's an editor's job to obsess over the beauty and precision of language-and Jackson says he does this too-he wants more from his books than their aesthetic value. And it's paying off: Ta-Nehisi Coates' Between the World and Me won the National Book Award; Eddie Huang's Fresh Off the Boat is now an ABC sitcom; Just Mercy is set to become a feature film in 2020. "In this moment when a lot of people are feeling despair," he says, "I get to participate in imagining what can be."

Lisa Nishimura

Vice president of original documentary and comedy programming at Netflix

Back when Netflix was a DVD-mailing service-before streaming changed everything-Lisa Nishimura was in charge of buying movies from all over the world for the company. She knew that the stories she found, from Bollywood romances to obscure anime titles, might never have reached U.S. audiences had she not brought them in. More than a decade later, Nishimura's role has expanded. Today she ushers to the screen various forms of nonfiction storytelling and comedy specials, and she brings the same zeal she once applied to hunting down the rarest gems-only now, tailored to the era of binge-watching.

If you've consumed whole a buzzy Netflix series, there's a good chance Nishimura was behind it: the true-crime sensation Making a Murderer and the bizarre cult saga Wild Wild Country both owe thanks to her commitment to championing under-the-radar filmmakers. She argued that people would binge nonfiction in the same way they would dramas like Orange Is the New Black and House of Cards. And she was right. Making a Murderer, which came as part of a wave of true-crime stories sweeping America in 2015, drew so many viewers that it renewed public interest in overturning the convictions of its subjects.

Nishimura also helped secure Dave Chappelle's splashy 2017 return to the screen after a 13-year hiatus, and she gave comedians Hannah Gadsby and Ali Wong their biggest stages. "I'm drawn to filmmakers and comedians that have an incredibly clear and personal point of view-it's just bubbling over," she says. Documentaries and comedies, for all their differences, both allow audiences to have an "immersion in another person's experience, almost firsthand." When their work is treated with care, viewers of all kinds feel better understood, she says.

And now, as Netflix grows with breakneck speed, Nishimura is considering how everything she brings to the platform will land with its growing global audience. "I'm programming for the world," she says.

Rhea Combs

Curator of film and photography at the National Museum of African American History and Culture

Among the many artifacts collected at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture is a recently discovered photograph of Harriet Tubman. The photo, which shows Tubman sitting against a stark white background, captures the famed abolitionist in her mid-40s in the years following the Civil War. An unusual look at Tubman in her younger years, the photo offers a new perspective on the rarely photographed freedom fighter. It's also exactly the type of object Rhea Combs looks for when she puts together exhibitions.

"In most images of Harriet Tubman, she's in her 80s, 90s. She's feeble-looking," Combs says. Finding the photo of a younger Tubman made her full humanity clearer. Looking at this new artifact, she says, "I can understand how this woman could get people to move and fight for their own freedom."

As a curator at the museum, tickets to which consistently sell out, Combs searches for quotidian items that might stretch museumgoers' common understanding of history. After years in academia studying film, visual culture, race and gender, she was compelled to bring her research out of the ivory tower and into the public. The images and films that make up Combs' research help her to identify visual through lines in history, as with an exhibition on photography in hip-hop in which she paired images of contemporary artists, like Queen Latifah, that mirrored artists from the past, like the Harlem Renaissance entertainer Gladys Bentley.

Combs seeks to show history on a continuum. She put together the museum's inaugural film festival in 2018, where she screened a number of iconic African-American films dealing with themes of power and place, among other subjects. In particular, she seeks out work from filmmakers whose work has long gone ignored, or from contemporary independent artists who have not had their films distributed in theaters.

Another of Combs' prized photographs depicts the civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer, who helped organize Mississippi's Freedom Summer, smiling with her husband. Most people who know of Hamer picture her at work. But there is value in the in-between, says Combs. "It's within those everyday moments that we better understand who those people were, and how we can become agents within history making as well."

Nikesh Shukla

Writer, editor of The Good Immigrant

When Nikesh Shukla was shopping around his first novel, a white agent told the British-Indian author his characters were not "authentically Asian enough." Another declined because they had plans to work with another Indian writer. "I was like, 'We can write about different stuff,'" he recalls. His novel, Coconut Unlimited, was eventually published, but he knew he wasn't alone in this struggle. He often thought about his uncle, the first person in the U.K. to bring a racial discrimination case to court after being rejected while trying to buy a house. "He stood up for what was right," Shukla says. "I wanted to stand up for people that I didn't feel like had a voice."

Now, he wants people of color to write the stories they've always wanted to tell. In the collection The Good Immigrant, he compiled 15 essays from minority writers that explore the impacts of being othered in the country you call home. But, he says, "Not all writers of color want to write about race. They want to write sci-fi or creative nonfiction about beekeeping." So Shukla launched The Good Journal, a magazine that invites minority writers to share stories beyond the scope of race or immigration. The journal includes personal essays from crime writers and works from emerging poets.

Moving forward, Shukla is eager to include more contributors whose experiences reflect other identities that intersect with race, like class, disability and sexual orientation. An American version of The Good Immigrant, featuring essays from 26 first and second-generation immigrants in the U.S., will be released on Feb. 19.

Shukla, too, wants to focus on the subjects that interest him. His most recent book, Run, Riot, dealt with weighty themes centering on gentrification and police brutality. His next subjects-love and joy-might not seem radical. But to him, they are. "The revolutionary, joyful act is writing about brown people in love," he says. "We never get to see that."

Jason Moran and Q-Tip

Artistic director of jazz and artistic director of hip-hop at the Kennedy Center

In the four years since Jason Moran became the artistic director of jazz at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, he's built a skate park on its steps, paired stand-up comedy with abstract jazz performances and facilitated live painting at concerts. In short, he's shown one of the nation's most prominent cultural institutions what a living, breathing American art form can look like in real time.

"Part of my role as a curator is to make sure the sensibilities are diverse enough, that we aren't just presenting one thing," says the pianist and composer, a 2010 recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship "genius" grant. "It's about informing the institution that there have been major gaps, things that you could frankly say they have ignored in the past."

Moran's push to recognize diverse voices in jazz is paralleled by the efforts of Q-Tip, A Tribe Called Quest's philosophical MC and producer, who was named the center's inaugural artistic director of hip-hop culture in 2016.

The rapper, a champion of socially conscious hip-hop, regards his role as not only a curator but also a historian. "We take a view of the landscape in not only hip-hop culture, but what's happening socially and nationally," he says. His innovations so far include the formation of a Hip Hop Culture Council, which helps to create projects that celebrate the past, present and future of the art form. The Council relies on the insights of industry notables like Questlove, the drummer and bandleader of The Roots, and hip-hop founding father Fab 5 Freddy.

But he's most excited about an award, still in the works, that will be bestowed upon hip-hop artists, akin to the center's prestigious annual Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. The honor feels especially poignant considering that for a long time, the genre was not recognized as an elevated art form-a perception that's now shifting, in part thanks to Q-Tip's efforts. "It's all about a consistency and dedication to the culture," he says. "Through those things, there's a truth in what you do."

Damian Woetzel

President of the Juilliard School

Damian Woetzel is overflowing with ideas for ways Juilliard's students can engage with the world around them. The former New York City Ballet principal dancer, who spent 23 years with the company before retiring in 2008, has made outreach and collaboration hallmarks of his leadership since taking over the prestigious school in July 2018.

"There's a higher level of excellence that comes when you invest in a creative and dynamic collaborative spirit," Woetzel tells TIME. "It's how we get our ideas. They can't live in a vacuum."

For more than 100 years, Juilliard has trained performing artists who lead their fields around the world. Alumni include the likes of Jessica Chastain and Viola Davis, Itzhak Perlman and Renée Fleming, to name just a few. This is not a responsibility Woetzel takes lightly. The tall ambitions of its students is part of why he believes so deeply in collaboration: to be the best, artists need a broad range of knowledge, he says.

One way he has pursued his goal of collaboration is through the Creative Associates program, which brings established artists in a variety of fields to Juilliard to teach and work with students throughout the year. This year, the group has included the Late Show with Stephen Colbert bandleader Jon Batiste, hip-hop dancer Lil Buck, tap dancer and choreographer Michelle Dorrance, clown Bill Irwin and composer Caroline Shaw, the youngest recipient ever of the Pulitzer Prize for Music.

Juilliard has a long tradition of viewing the artist as citizen. The idea, Woetzel says, is to create artists who use their art to impact their communities. Instrumental to this goal is the assurance that the artists Juilliard sends back out into their communities come from a wide range of communities themselves. This summer, Juilliard will host a program for underrepresented string players with the Sphinx Organization, a Detroit nonprofit. As they're trying to improve the world through art, Woetzel wants his students to remember: "Artistic ability is far greater than opportunity, and that is something we all need to work at."

Erin Christovale

Assistant curator at the Hammer Museum

Less than a decade into her career, Erin Christovale is a regular on "young curators to watch" lists. She has been recognized within the art world for her annual film program and a 2016 show at the Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery about citizenship and democracy, among other work. But despite all the buzz, Christovale is focused on a central mission: engaging people who have never set foot in a museum before. And so far, they're showing up.

Christovale traces her curatorial approach to her time as a film student at the University of Southern California. She remembers one particular discussion about how the 1915 film The Birth of a Nation helped foment a revival of the Ku Klux Klan. "Film is the most widely distributed form of visual media, and it has the capacity to shift society's thinking and be a political tool," she says." So after graduating, she began organizing film programming and exhibits, highlighting work by emerging queer artists and artists of color, before being named an assistant curator at UCLA's Hammer Museum.

She co-founded Black Radical Imagination in 2013 with her collaborator, Amir George. The program includes conventional cinema alongside avant-garde video art made by black artists. From the beginning, it was important to Christovale and George that the more experimental work not feel intimidating to their audience. "We always have a talk back, and try and bring the filmmakers into the conversation, because we understand that the audience we are bringing in may not be used to viewing experimental work."

At the Hammer Museum, Christovale's prioritization of the accessibility of art has remained intact. "The goal of my shows are to be sites of conversation, where people are thinking about these art objects as agents of change," she says. "A public museum is supposed to be a civic space."

Last summer, Christovale co-curated the Hammer's "Made in L.A." exhibition, which included more than 30 diverse artists from the city. One work, by EJ Hill, had a particular impact. As part of his installation, Hill stood on a podium every day with no breaks. As a queer, black man, his presence was a physical declaration of resilience. While performance art can often alienate, Hill's piece resonated. "People would burst into tears. People would bring him fruit and flowers and sing to him," Christovale recalls. "It's so simple. When you offer space in which people can see themselves reflected in the work, then they will come."

Bird Runningwater

Director of the Native Program at Sundance

It takes about 30 minutes to drive from the Mescalero Apache Reservation in rural New Mexico to the closest movie theater. In the 1970s, Bird Runningwater and his father relished their trips there to see popular films like Rocky.

But it wasn't long before he realized his heritage wasn't represented onscreen, and he stopped going to the movies. "I'll go do other things because I know I'm not going to see people like me on the screen," Runningwater recalls thinking as a child. Decades later, that disappointed child has grown up to become part of the solution. As director of the Native Program at the Sundance Institute, he supports and solicits indigenous filmmakers to present their work at the Sundance Film Festival and beyond.

Under Runningwater's guidance, the Native Program works with indigenous filmmakers around the world through labs and forums. Previous participants include the Oscar-nominated director Taika Waititi, a Native New Zealander who went on to direct Marvel's Thor: Ragnarok in 2017. Waititi's 2010 dramedy, Boy, is one of Runningwater's favorite projects to debut at Sundance-and the highest-grossing film ever in New Zealand until another of Waititi's movies, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, overtook it six years later. Another alumnus of the program, Sterlin Harjo, directed the 2007 feature Four Sheets to the Wind, which was nominated for the grand jury prize at Sundance.

Runningwater's childhood gripe still holds true. "Native Americans are invisible in American culture," he says. According to UCLA's Hollywood Diversity Report, Native Americans made up only 0.5 percent of film roles in 2016's 200 top theatrical releases. "Because we have a visibility issue, we have to establish the narrative." To him, that means owning the storytelling process rather than seeing stories told from the outside. It's not that Native American stories have never been told in film. But many of those movies either feature stereotypes of indigenous people or are told from the perspectives of white filmmakers or characters, if not both.

Change in Hollywood is slow. But Runningwater hopes that when the next generation on his reservation travels to the theater, they'll see someone they identify with onscreen.

Rujeko Hockley

Assistant curator at the Whitney Museum

In the spring of 2017, the Biennial exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art became a site of controversy when a painting by a white artist, Dana Schutz, depicting the mutilated body of Emmett Till sparked protests about institutional racism in the art world. Just two months after the Biennial ended, Rujeko Hockley, who had just taken a role at the storied museum of American art, co-curated her first exhibition there, "An Incomplete History of Protest." Rather than shy away from the still smoldering controversy, Hockley and her colleagues made a bold choice: including the Whitney's own history as a place of protest in the exhibit, with documents and letters from the museum's archives.

To Hockley, we can't fully engage with art without understanding the circumstances under which it was created. "I don't want to talk about the rise of minimalism in the 1960s without also talking about the lead-up to the Vietnam War and the civil rights movement," she says. Throughout her career, Hockley has assembled politically potent exhibits. Her 2017 Brooklyn Museum show, "We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women 1965-85," showcased art made by black women during the rise of the second-wave feminist movement. Her goal is to show people that art history and history  history are one and the same. She urges museumgoers to consider not just the artwork but also the artists' experiences. "Artists don't live in a vacuum, and they don't make in a vacuum," she says. "So it doesn't make sense to have an art history that doesn't take into account world-changing events."

Next up, Hockley will co-curate the Whitney's 2019 Biennial. The 2017 protests might make someone in her position nervous. But she sees them as confirmation of the value of museums. "People really do care about museums and look to the arts for guidance," she says. And while curators must be responsible for what they put out in the world, Hockley says, "It doesn't mean we have to be gun-shy. Just more thoughtful."

Kevin Young

Director of the Schomburg Center and poetry editor of the New Yorker

In 1925, two New York City institutions were founded: the New Yorker and the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Nearly a century later, poet Kevin Young holds leading posts at both. His aim: to make people care about words and the history behind them.

This might sound daunting in the America of 2019, as urgent news breaks hourly and dire headlines announce the decline of libraries and attention spans alike. But for Young, those realities make this a perfect time to appreciate poetry and art. Both his jobs allow him to dig through the past to understand the present. "I'm not an archivist by training," he says. "But by temperament, I love thinking about history and how it talks to now."

At the New Yorker, Young sees hundreds of submissions from contemporary poets each week, but he also has access to the magazine's long institutional memory. Within this playground, he has created projects like a series of multimedia poem-letters written throughout 2017 between National Book Award finalist Ada Limon and MacArthur "genius" grant winner Natalie Diaz. He also recently published a previously untranslated poem by Bertolt Brecht, the German playwright who died in 1956. Young has found new meaning in historic texts at the Schomburg, too. There, he acquired the never-before-seen manuscript of Malcolm X's biography and a "lost" unpublished chapter and displayed them in the museum's lobby.

Young's love for the past is in part inspired by his family history, which goes back hundreds of years in Louisiana. When he visited as a child, he felt connected to the generations of family rooted there. "It makes you want to know about the past but also sometimes to escape it. That combination really drives me," he says. "Thinking about how we can know more about the past and also fighting that impulse to say we're past it is really important."

Young reckons with these questions in his own work: 10 collections of poetry, eight poetry collections he's edited and two nonfiction books. But he sees other contemporary black artists grappling with them too. "I see us as [being] in this new renaissance," he says. Young cites fellow creators like Barry Jenkins, whose film Moonlight won the Oscar for Best Picture in 2017; Colson Whitehead, whose novel The Underground Railroad was a New York Times best-seller and won the Pulitzer Prize; and Tracy K. Smith, the U.S. poet laureate. These artists are "thinking about our shared humanity but also talking about American history and its questions and challenges," he explains.

"To me, poetry has long been alive. It's continuing to live and it's also thriving right now," Young says. "I'm interested in capturing that aliveness."
Portrait illustration by Alexandra Compain-Tissier for TIME See the 2019 Optimists issue, guest-edited by Ava DuVernay. Correction, Feb. 7 The original version of this story misstated Q-Tip's involvement in a concert during which the rapper Nas performed alongside the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center. Q-Tip was not involved in the event.
Write to Abigail Abrams at abigail.abrams@time.com, Cady Lang at cady.lang@timemagazine.com, Mahita Gajanan at mahita.gajanan@time.com, Rachel E. Greenspan at rachel.greenspan@time.com and Wilder Davies at wilder.davies@time.com.

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12 Leaders Who Are Shaping the Next Generation of Artists

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From a Netflix exec to a curator at the Whitney, these 12 leaders are helping define the next generation of artists.