
Rachel L. Swarns
Rachel L. Swarns is a journalism professor at New York University and a contributing writer for The New York Times. She is the author of The 272: The Families Who Were Enslaved and Sold to Build the American Catholic Church and American TapestryThe Story of the Black, White, and Multiracial Ancestors of Michelle Obama, and a co-author of Unseen. Her work has been recognized and supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Ford Foundation, the Biographers International Organization, the Leon Levy Center for Biography, the MacDowell artist residency program, and others.