Leah Donnella
Leah Donnella is an editor on NPR's Code Switch team, where she helps produce and edit for the Code Switch podcast, blog, and newsletter. She created the "Ask Code Switch" series, where members of the team respond to listener questions about how race, identity, and culture come up in everyday life.
Donnella originally came to NPR in September 2015 as an intern for Code Switch. Prior to that, she was a summer intern at WHYY's Public Media Commons, where she helped teach high school students the ins and outs of journalism and film-making. She spent a lot of time out in the hot Philly sun tracking down unsuspecting tourists for on-the-street interviews. She also worked at the University of Pennsylvania in the department of College Houses and Academic Resources.
Donnella graduated from Pomona College with a Bachelor of Arts in Africana Studies.
-
We asked you to send us your racial conundrums. And in the first 'Ask Code Switch,' we take on a big one: How do you talk to family members whose racial views seem stuck in the Stone Age?
-
Dressed up as academic reasoning, racist tropes pushed by white identity advocates become more palatable, allowing those ideas to move from the fringes of debate to the political mainstream.
-
The "DNA Discussion Project" brings students, staff and faculty at West Chester University together to learn about their genetic heritage. For some people, the revelations are hard to digest.
-
As we light a candle on the Code Switch podcast's birthday cake, our team looks back on the stories that mattered.
-
The Pan-African flag, designed by Marcus Garvey in 1920, was intended as an expression of black liberation. It's still used around the world.
-
We got more than 100 letters from our listeners about how y'all feel like fakes. Here are some of our favorites.
-
In the meantime, some are producing their own shows or creating material for alternative platforms like YouTube.
-
Traffic fines in California have an outsize effect on low-income drivers and minorities.
-
Yara Shahidi is not all like the character she plays on ABC's Black-ish. But the actor and her character have hit a lot of the same milestones at the same time.
-
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood was a best-seller list after the 2016 election. We reread the dystopian classic to prep for a new TV miniseries that begins next week.
-
You could say it's been a pretty turbulent week on the race beat.
-
Prince on defining his music: "The only thing I could think of, because I really don't like categories, but the only thing I could think of is inspirational."