<p>Akilah Hughes is a writer, comedian, YouTuber, and podcaster. Hughes is the co-host of Crooked Media's <a href="https://crooked.com/podcast-series/what-a-day/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>What A Day</em></a><em> </em>podcast and one of the few black women hosting a daily news podcast. Podcasting has a representation problem. There are more podcasts than ever before, but women and people of colour are still sorely underrepresented as hosts, especially when it comes to daily news.</p><br><p>This week's episode is hosted by Jess Joho, a staff writer at Mashable based in Los Angeles. In this episode, Hughes discusses representation in podcasting, her book <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Obviously-Stories-Timeline-Akilah-Hughes/dp/1101998903" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Obviously: Stories from My Timeline</em></a><em>, </em>and how she practices self-care as someone reporting on daily news. In the episode, Hughes shares her admiration for Constance Baker Motley, an African-American civil rights activist and and the first&nbsp;African American&nbsp;woman to become a federal&nbsp;judge. Motley was the assistant attorney to&nbsp;Thurgood Marshall&nbsp;arguing the case&nbsp;<a href="https://www.naacpldf.org/ldf-celebrates-60th-anniversary-brown-v-board-education/meet-legal-minds-behind-brown-v-board-education/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Brown v. Board of Education</em></a>, a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. Motley was the first black woman to serve in the&nbsp;New York State&nbsp;Senate and the first woman to be Manhattan Borough President. Motley was a lead trial attorney for a number of significant civil rights cases, and represented Martin Luther King, Jr., the&nbsp;Freedom Riders, and the Birmingham Children Marchers. She was widely <a href="https://www.naacpldf.org/ldf-celebrates-60th-anniversary-brown-v-board-education/meet-legal-minds-behind-brown-v-board-education/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">regarded</a> as the leading courtroom strategist of the civil rights movement.</p><br><p><strong>Important note:</strong> This episode was recorded in February 2020, during Black History Month in the U.S. when the Democratic Primaries were in full swing.</p><br><p><strong>Please subscribe, rate, and review.&nbsp;</strong>Find us on Twitter and Instagram: @HBHPod. You can find Jess Joho on Twitter @jessjoho. You can find Akilah Hughes on Twitter @AkilahObviously.</p><br><p>Special thanks to Akilah Hughes and Jess Joho.</p><br><p><strong>Credits: </strong></p><p>Host: Jess Joho</p><p>Creator: Rachel Thompson</p><p>Producers: Maria Dermentzi and Nikolay Nikolov</p><p>Editor: Shannon Connellan</p><p>Music: Christianne Straker</p><p>Illustration: Vicky Leta</p><hr><p style='color:grey; font-size:0.75em;'> Hosted on Acast. See <a style='color:grey;' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer' href='https://acast.com/privacy'>acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.</p>