Writing for just publics: A conversation with Tressie McMillan Cottom

Tressie McMillan Cottom, PhD is an associate professor in the iSchool at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Information, Technology and Public Life (UNC), Faculty Associate at Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center, and 2020 MacArthur Fellow. Audiences and institutions have lauded her for incisive analysis and impact.

Her current research examines racial capitalism in platform economies and what she calls “hustleprenuership.” From her award-winning essay collection THICK (2019 National Book Award Finalist) to the critically acclaimed Lower Ed, McMillan Cottom centers Black women as rational actors making the best of the choices they are given.