Fuels monitoring assistant Emily McCrea, 23, watches over a prescribed burn by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Division of Fire just outside of Elmo, Mont., on Tuesday, October 24, 2017. McCrea was one of only two women working on the burn site that day. Tribes used prescribed burns long before European settlers arrived. Burns are made using a quilt technique that serves as a barrier preventing more intense fires from spreading. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Tre’ana Taylor, 17, in the bedroom she shares with her sister and niece at her home in Springfield, Mass., on Monday, September, 11, 2017. When she was 15, Taylor became pregnant and her son, CJ, died after he was born prematurely. She has high hopes of being a mother again, after she’s completed her schooling to become an OB/GYN. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
A pair of gloves rests on a bible during a Sunday service at the Third Baptist Church in the Fillmore district of San Francisco, Calif., on November 5, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Aisha Mohamud, 13, lies on her couch as her mother, Waris Mohamud, helps her little brother, Abdullah, tell a classic Somali story at their home in Minneapolis, Minn., on Thursday, October 12, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Destiny Montez, 17, with her girlfriend, Jenny Sacco, 17, at the Agawam Dog Park, where they took Jenny’s dog and hung out with friends in Agawam, Mass., on Saturday, September, 9, 2017. The pair have been together for two years and have hopes of moving in together following high school. When Destiny first came out to her mother, she was disowned by her and has faced bullying at school for her sexuality. Still, she has high hopes of connecting with others through music and sharing her story. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
An electrical pole is over powered by kudzu in Hi Hat, Ky., on Friday, September 22, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Lizzie Jones, 17, proudly wears her father’s employee of the month jacket from his time working at the coal mines. She stands next to a shelf of her family’s relics from the coal industry at her home in eastern Kentucky, on Sunday, September 24, 2017. Jones’ father passed away from black lung disease in 2014. In January 2017, her mother, who also worked in the coal mining industry, passed away. Jones has developed a complex relationship with the coal industry that both built her community and stole her parent’s life. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Fuels monitoring assistant Emily McCrea, 23, watches over a prescribed burn by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Division of Fire just outside of Elmo, Mont., on Tuesday, October 24, 2017. McCrea was one of only two women working on the burn site that day. Tribes used prescribed burns long before European settlers arrived. Burns are made using a quilt technique that serves as a barrier preventing more intense fires from spreading. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
The prescribed burn prepared by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes Division of Fire skims the ridge line just outside of Elmo, Montana., on Tuesday, October 24, 2017.
Xavier Smith, 17, who is Navajo and Filipino, sits at the kitchen table in his grandmothers home as his grandmother, mother, his mother’s boyfriend enjoy a card game, in Pablo, Mont., on the Flathead Reservation on Saturday, October 21, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
The sun beams down on the winding roads outside of Pikeville, Ky., on Tuesday, September 19, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Remnants of coal are left outside of a non-operative coal wash in Justiceville Ky., on Friday, September 29, 2017. Donald Trump’s promise to revive the coal industry was a major driver of votes in eastern Kentucky during the 2016 election. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Floyd Central High School cheerleaders work to form their pom-poms into a heart shape for a group photo before a football game in Langley, Ky., on Friday, September 22, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
London Gladden, 17, (second from right) is consoled by her friends and teammates after a boy made a remark that made her cry before cheerleading practice at the High School of Commerce in Springfield, Mass., on Friday, September, 8, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Jasmin La Caris, a modern flamenco and contemporary dancer, stretches before a performance with her husband, a modern mariachi singer, in downtown Fresno, Calif., on Saturday, November 11, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Angie Heard Minnie, center, watches intently as a play is made during a football game at Floyd Central High School in Langley, Ky., on Friday, September 22, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Members of the congregation sit for a luncheon following the service at the Third Baptist Church in the Fillmore district of San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday, November 5, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
A memorial stands against a telephone pole at the edge of a highway spanning miles of agriculture in Fresno, Calif., on Friday, November 10, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Lindsay Burland Roullier, 27, an enrolled member of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribe, a forest technician and wild and fire fighter, at the site of a controlled burn she had been working on outside of Elmo, Mont., on Tuesday, October 24, 2017. Roullier’s father worked as a member of the CSKT Division of Fire for nearly 22 years when he was killed by a drunk driver coming home from work. She said she started working in the Division of Fire to honor his legacy. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Smoke rises from a smoldering remnant of the Rice Ridge fire that burned over 150,000 acres in the forest outside of Seeley Lake, Mont., on Thursday, October 29, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Waylon flicks off the camera while posing for a portrait at the home of his girlfriend in Pablo, Mont., on Saturday, October 21, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
London Gladden, 17, during cheerleading practice at the High School of Commerce in Springfield, Mass., on Friday, September, 8, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Losa Mi, 21, adjusts her outfit in the bathroom during a holiday party for the LGBT community at Menjos, a gay club in Detroit, Mich. on Saturday, December 16, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Haley Jarvis, 17, watches “Sing,” a children’s movie, with her daughter Paisley, 2, at her boyfriend’s home in Langley, Ky., on Tuesday, September 26, 2017. Jarvis works part time at the local McDonalds and upon graduating from high school will have to make a difficult decision of whether to stay in the region where job opportunities have been on the decline, or to move away. She said moving away to a university outside of the county would limit her access to childcare. At home, she has support from her boyfriend’s family and her own. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
A church light remains on as the sun falls behind the mountains at the edge of the Flathead Reservation in Pablo, Mont., on Sunday, October 22, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Mary Sloane, an English teacher at Floyd Central High School, prays for a member of her congregation at First Baptist Church in McDowell, Ky., on Sunday, September 24, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
From left to right, Maryam Warsame, 13, Nada Tohu, 13, and Ikran Ibrahim, 12, outside the Brian Coyle center in the Cedar Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minn., on Thursday, October 12, 2017. The Twin Cities are home to the largest Somali-American population in the United States. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Aliza Gonzalez, 17, puts on lip gloss while talking to friends in her journalism class at the High School of Commerce in Springfield, Mass., on Monday, September, 11, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
A single photograph featuring Command Sergeant Major Aliza Gonzalez hangs on the wall in a JROTC classroom in Springfield, Mass., on Monday, September, 11, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
A barbed wire fence partially blocks a pathway in front of acres of citrus trees in Fresno, Calif., on Friday, November 10, 2017. (Brittany Greeson/GroundTruth)
Lizzie Jones sat quietly looking over patches of dirt and gravel as a warm wind pushed gold strands of hair from her face. She had come to visit her parents, both of them buried in the hillside of eastern Kentucky. Sitting quietly, letting herself “just be,” was her way of having a dialogue with them. “Even though they are not here, I feel like their memories are still alive,” she said.
Three years ago, Lizzie’s father passed after a tumultuous battle with black lung disease. Just over a year ago, her mother followed. Lizzie still isn’t positive what killed her mother — she has a theory that part of it was the heartbreak from losing her life-long partner. Both of Lizzie’s parents were proud coal miners; they even met in the mines.
Still, Lizzie has a complex relationship with coal. She understands that her parents’ killer was the very thing that gave them a stable life. She sees herself as an example of both the prosperity and devastation the coal industry brought to Appalachia.
Throughout the 2016 election, as pundits, politicians and journalists passed through this hurting region, they failed to grasp the complexity of Lizzie’s experience, the experiences of others like her. During such a significant moment in history, why were the young women — for whom the national issues weren’t just a talking point, but a deep part of their personal experience — still underrepresented? Because of stories like her own, Lizzie wants to someday become one of those journalists, but better.
Lizzie and I were born into a world shaped by generations of women before us, who fought so that they could be recognized as more than second class citizens. Yet, we came of age in a perplexing time for women. Despite the aspirational thought that we could be anything, the reality is that women’s ambitions are still limited. We were told we could be president, yet we were never seriously considered as contenders. We make up over half the population, yet we are still heavily underrepresented in politics, in boardrooms, in media and have little influence in public life.
Women’s lack of influence has left deafening silence in our country. And the silencing of women — all women — whether it be in a bar room conversation, a board meeting or in national politics, has created an underserved democracy.
Then in 2016, after 44 elections, the first female was nominated as a presidential candidate for a major party. Some of us felt a glimmer of hope. Some of us felt a slap in the face that our option was limited to just one major party candidate. Regardless, a man — who admitted to sexually assaulting women — was elected. The women I grew up with, white women without college degrees, helped put him there. I got closer to an answer for how much progress women had really made.
By the time Donald Trump was in office, I set out on a cross country journey with a team of reporters to understand why our country had become so divided. Along the way, I kept meeting young women like Lizzie, young women who were living the issues that shaped the election and appeared to divide a nation: the significance of faith, the complexity of coal country’s grievances, racial tension, and immigration.
I saw an opportunity to use their photographs to challenge decades of inequality.
I learned that womanhood is not easily defined. It is not a box that can be easily checked, but is instead a multifaceted existence where gender identity, sexuality, race, and class all play a crucial role. Our country is not “red or blue,” but rather a patchwork of political persuasions and experiences. This election may have turned out differently had our country figured that out sooner.
I know women’s rights and women’s positions in the United States are at a turning point. However, I’m unsure if I’ll see bona fide equality in my lifetime. I see hope from the women who brought down sexual predators in Hollywood and government, and the surge in interest from women who want to run for office following the election. But I see darkness when women are pitted against one another. By exploring the lives of up and coming creators, thinkers, and leaders in this photo essay, we are getting a free preview of our country’s future.