What do you believe is the single most important factor driving up the cost of living in Nigeria?

Quick question: what do these titles have in common? A Dark Continent Seeking Light; Sure, Ebola is Bad. Africa has Worse, or; Magic and Cannibalism in the African Jungle. You guessed it—they're all about Africa. But the most correct answer is they're all headlines that have appeared in the prestigious New York Times newspaper.

They're just some examples of the ways that many traditional news outlets in the west have historically reported about Africa. Today news reporting that reinforces negative perceptions, stereotyping and racial misrepresentation is declining. But the harms inflicted on the continent and its communities remain unresolved.

US media scholar Meredith Clark predicted that 2021 would be the "year journalism starts paying reparations". She coined the term "reparative journalism" to mean a new approach for the US news media "to redeem itself … through radically inclusive editorial choices".

As if to answer this call, many news organizations have published prominent apologies. These acknowledge their racialized framing of the news or links to slavery.

Other forms of redress have also gained recognition. The 1619 Project in The New York Times Magazine, for example, is a platform for marginalized communities to revisit the history of slavery and racism. In the UK, The Guardian created a similar project, Cotton Capital, as part of a broader restorative justice program.

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