2020 Year in Review

This year, we received nearly 400 applications and awarded 10 2021 New America National Fellowships. The competitive selection process is reflected in the immense talent of the 10 National Fellows who earned a spot in this class. Meet the Class of 2021, and learn more about the applicant pool by reading our Class of 2021 “Who Applied?” report.

This year, New America’s National Fellows published eight books on fascinating topics ranging from the “Deep State” to the lab-grown meat movement to agricultural espionage. As always, our National Fellows are bringing challenging issues to the forefront of public discourse.

George Packer was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in biography for his book Our Man. Nikole Hannah-Jones was awarded the 2020 Pulitzer Prize in commentary for her essay for “The 1619 Project.”

Two books by New America Fellows, Julian E. Zelizer’s Burning Down the House and Reginald Dwayne Betts’s Felon, were on the New York Times’ “100 Notable Books of 2020” list.

Franchise by Marcia Chatelain was included on the New York Times’ “Times Critics’ Top Books of 2020” list as well as on Smithsonian Magazine's "Smithsonian Scholars Pick Their Favorite Books of 2020" list.

Two books by New America Fellows were included on Kirkus Reviews’ list “The Best Books of 2020”: Lauren Redniss’s Oak Flat on the "Best Science and Nature Books of 2020" list and Joshua Yaffa’s Between Two Fires on the “Best Books 2020: Tracking Autocracy & White Supremacy” list.

The 2020 NPR Book Concierge recommended two Fellows' books: Between Two Fires by Joshua Yaffa, and What Can a Body Do? by Sara Hendren.

The following six 2020 books were reviewed in the New York Times: Between Two Fires by Joshua Yaffa, Franchise by Marcia Chatelain, In Deep by David Rohde, Billion Dollar Burger by Chase Purdy, Burning Down the House by Julian E. Zelizer, and Oak Flat by Lauren Redniss. Mara Hvistendahl’s The Scientist and the Spy was reviewed in the Washington Post, and Sara Hendren’s What Can a Body Do? was reviewed in the New Yorker.

In addition to books, we are honored to have supported a number of projects in film, TV, and podcasting. Vann R. Newkirk II reported and hosted Floodlines, a podcast from the Atlantic documenting the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which was named the New Yorker’s Best Podcast of 2020 and made TIME's "10 Best Podcasts of 2020" list as well as the Economist’s list of “The Best Podcasts of 2020.” Greg Barker released two films: The Longest War, a SHOWTIME documentary about the human stories and drama behind America's involvement in Afghanistan, now the longest war in U.S. history, and Sergio, a Netflix original movie based on his 2009 award-winning film of the same name. The film, which was reviewed in the New York Times, was one of 118 feature films to premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2020. In June, Greg Jacobs released his film No Small Matter, about the power and potential impact of quality early childhood education. The New York Times Magazine’s “The 1619 Project," led by Nikole Hannah-Jones with contributions from Clint Smith, Trymaine Lee, and Reginald Dwayne Betts, will be adapted into film, TV programming, and more by Oprah Winfrey, Lionsgate, and the New York Times. Landfall, a film by Cecilia Aldarondo about the aftermath of Hurricane María, has been acquired by POV and will air on PBS in 2021. The film also won the DOC NYC Viewfinders Grand Jury Prize and the Grand Jury Award for Best Documentary Feature at the Florida Film Festival, among other awards. Raúl O. Paz-Pastrana’s film Border South, about immigrant resilience amidst a violent and negligent global migration system, will stream on OVID.tv starting in December.

Along with captivating, award-winning books, films, and podcasts, our Fellows also produced a variety of longform articles and reporting projects.

• Nikole Hannah-Jones wrote a cover article for the New York Times Magazine about what is owed Black Americans.
• David Rohde wrote a feature story for the New Yorker about Attorney General William Barr.
• Theodore Johnson wrote for the New York Times Magazine about the history of the Black vote.
• Matthew Shaer wrote a cover story for the New York Times Magazine about the immigrant, minority, and poor communities that have been disproportionately affected by the coronavirus pandemic. He also wrote a feature story for Esquire about how one Arizona community is responding to alarming teen suicide rates, and a feature story for Slate about court fines for teenagers, and the lasting effects on their families.
• Reginald Dwayne Betts wrote a feature story for the New York Times Magazine about Kamala Harris, her past as a prosecutor, and his thoughts as an ex-convict. His article was also featured on The Daily podcast.
• Suki Kim wrote a feature story for the New Yorker about an underground movement trying to topple the North Korean regime.
• Mosi Secret wrote a feature story for GQ about fathers who have lost sons to police violence.
• Daniela Lamas wrote a series of op-eds for the New York Times about her experiences as an ICU doctor in Boston’s Brigham and Women’s hospital during the coronavirus pandemic.

• Patricia Evangelista wrote an article for Rappler documenting the experiences of Filipinos on the front lines during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Matthew Davis wrote for the Los Angeles Review of Books about having a child during the pandemic.
• Eve L. Ewing contributed to the New York Times’ podcast Nice White Parents about building a better school system, and what gets in the way, which made TIME's "10 Best Podcasts of 2020" list.
• Visit the New America on COVID-19 page for a full catalog of reporting by New America Fellows and alumni on the coronavirus pandemic.

• Jeff Goodell received a 2020 Guggenheim Fellowship, awarded to individuals who have already demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts.
• Sarah J. Jackson and Azmat Khan were named 2020 Carnegie Fellows, awarded for high-caliber scholarship in the social sciences and humanities.
• Patrick Radden Keefe received the National Book Critics Circle Award for nonfiction and the Arthur Ross Book Award gold medal from the Council on Foreign Relations for his book Say Nothing. He was also interviewed on Late Night with Seth Meyers about his book.
• George Packer’s book Our Man received the 2019 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for biography. It also won the 2019 Hitchens Prize and received the silver medal for the Arthur Ross Book Award from the Council on Foreign Relations.
• Reginald Dwayne Betts’s book Felon won the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work – Poetry.

• Assia Boundaoui won the 2020 Livingston Award for national reporting for her PBS POV documentary The Feeling of Being Watched.
• The New York Times Magazine won two 2020 National Magazine Awards: in the public interest category for "The 1619 Project," created by Nikole Hannah-Jones with contributions from Trymaine Lee, Reginald Dwayne Betts, and Clint Smith, and in the podcasting category for three episodes of 1619, hosted by Hannah-Jones. Hannah-Jones, Lee, Betts, and Smith were also among “The 1619 Project” contributors who received a George Polk Special Award.
• Nomadland, a new film based on Jessica Bruder’s book of the same name, won the Golden Lion, the top prize at the 77th edition of the Venice Film Festival.

• Adam Harris was named to the 2021 Forbes 30 Under 30 list in media.
• Nikole Hannah-Jones was named a Fellow of the Society by the Society of Professional Journalism, the highest professional honor awarded by SPJ, for extraordinary contribution to the profession of journalism. She was also interviewed on Oprah Winfrey’s special "Where Do We Go From Here?" about this summer’s reckoning with racial injustice.
• Josie Duffy Rice was interviewed on Late Night with Seth Meyers and The Daily Show with Trevor Noah about her work in criminal justice reform.