Reporting on Black Lives Matter in 2020: How Digital Black Press Outlets Covered the Racial Uprisings

Abstract

George Floyd’s fatal police encounter sparked the largest social justice movement in American history. Black press journalists in the United States found themselves documenting and coping with Black trauma as they performed their duties in pandemic-mandated isolation. Through semi-structured interviews with digital Black press journalists, this study, which was conducted between 2020 and 2021, explores the reporting and personal strategies these journalists deployed during tumultuous times. We found they (1) provided humanizing and ongoing social justice coverage; (2) relied on Black experts, activists, and their readers as sources; (3) created social media content that appealed to Black and non-Black audiences; and (4) cared for each other and readers to build intracultural support. Our findings illuminate how the digital Black press practiced “movement journalism,” an approach that centers oppressed people and counters protest paradigm-style coverage.