New York Times journalism has the power to transform the way we see the world around us. The 1619 Project, published to honor the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American slavery, examines its legacy on our country and how it shaped nearly everything from music to traffic to capitalism—even our democracy itself. To underscore this, our film features actress Janelle Monáe reciting words from the 1619 Project in the exact location where the first enslaved Africans came to this nation—before we were yet a nation—confronting our assumptions about slavery’s legacy in America.