Janelle Harris Dixon

Janelle Harris Dixon

Janelle Harris Dixon is a Washington, DC-based writer and editor covering race, gender, culture and class.

On July 21, 1963, Gloria Richardson was walking from a meeting when her would-be attacker ran at her with his brandished weapon leveled at her neck. She flat-palmed the blade of the bayonet, shoving it away from her body. 

Women Who Shaped History

How Gloria Richardson's Look of Righteous Indignation Became a Symbol of No Retreat

In 1963, the civil rights leader shoved aside a guardsmen’s bayonet with disgust and defiance; photography preserved the charged moment

The exhibition is on view near a neighborhood recreation center that holds classes and homework time, even during the pandemic, and an all-boys high school. "I just feel like this block amplifies all of the messages expressed in the exhibit," says one of the show's organizers.

In a Covid-Affected Washington, D.C. Neighborhood, Black History Is Reinterpreted on a City Block

A powerful outdoor exhibition amplifies a message of "pride, tenacity and possibility"

HBCUs have consistently enrolled more Black women than men every year since 1976. As of 2018, those women comprise 62 percent of students.

How America's HBCUs Produced Generations of Black Women Leaders

Take a deep dive into the Smithsonian's artifacts and archives and explore the legacy of America's historically Black colleges and universities

"The lines of this song repay me in elation, almost of exquisite anguish, whenever I hear them sung," wrote James Weldon Johnson in 1935.

Why the Black National Anthem Is Lifting Every Voice to Sing

Scholars agree the song, endowed with its deep history of black pride, speaks to the universal human condition

The Anacostia Community Museum wants to know not just how you’re surviving this moment, but how you’re being resilient.

In This Historical Moment, Here’s How to Collect Your Thoughts

The Anacostia Community Museum wants your story for its new archive #Moments of Resilience

Last year, author Claire Evans visited the Smithsonian's Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden to join in conversation with Ellen Ullman, a former software engineer.

Why the Story of Woman Versus Machine Is Still Being Written

Author Claire Evans is on a mission to elevate women and the contributions they’ve made in the field of technology

A photo taken at a Free Huey Newton Rally in 1968 with five of the six women identifiable—Delores Henderson, Joyce Lee, Mary Ann Carlton, Joyce Means and Paula Hill—provides testament to those who actualized the daily operations of the Black Panther Party.

Women Who Shaped History

The Rank and File Women of the Black Panther Party and Their Powerful Influence

A portrait taken at a “Free Huey” rally defines the female force that both supported and propelled the movement

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