Award-winning journalist, translator, and university lecturer
Natasha Hakimi Zapata is an award-winning journalist, translator, and university lecturer based in Europe. Her book ANOTHER WORLD IS POSSIBLE: Lessons for America From Around the Globe is forthcoming from The New Press (February, 2025), and her articles appear regularly in The Nation, In These Times, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and elsewhere. She is the former foreign editor of Truthdig and has received several Southern California Journalism and National Arts & Entertainment Journalism awards, most recently in 2024 for her work as a foreign correspondent.
Published In
Featured Writing
The Nation Magazine (September 2024) · August 29th, 2024
The Recent Riots in the UK Should Be a Warning to Kamala Harris
Like the Tories, the new Labour government wants to blame immigration for Britain’s current troubles, but these have less to do with immigration than with deprivation.
Read it
The Nation · August 9th, 2024
Facing Far-Right Riots, Britain’s History—Good and Bad—Repeats Itself
Days of anti-immigrant violence across the United Kingdom were met with powerful anti-racist resistance after a tragedy left the country reeling.
Read it
Los Angeles Review of Books · January 15th, 2024
Race, Money, and the Pursuit of Poetry in the US Today: A Conversation with Megan Fernandes and Edgar Kunz
Megan Fernandes and Edgar Kunz may not write similar poems, but their poetry and their journeys intersect in more ways than one. As they both wrapped up overlapping book tours across the United States and Europe in recent months, I caught up with them via video call.
Read it
The Nation · December 12th, 2023
The Progressive Refugee Policy That Puts the West to Shame
Uganda’s role as a co-convenor of the Global Refugee Forum in Geneva this week should raise urgent questions about the interests behind its much-lauded open-door refugee policy.
Read it
The Nation · November 27th, 2023
The Ghosts of the Worldwide Surveillance Apparatus Show Their Hand
Phantom Parrot, a British documentary now screening in the US, sheds light on the Orwellian technologies being used across borders to repress activists, journalists, and others.
Read it
The Nation · April 24th, 2023
What the UK’s Arrest of a French Publisher Means for Public Intellectuals the World Over
The detention of Ernest Moret raises urgent questions about British authorities targeting public intellectuals at the request of other nations.
Read it
The Nation · October 20th, 2022
Liz Truss or No Liz Truss, Things Are Bleaker in Britain Than Anyone Realizes
As jaws drop around the world over the resignation of the UK’s shortest-lived prime minister, life here is getting considerably worse by the day.
Read it
The Nation · August 1st, 2022
Boris Johnson’s (Far From Final) Bill for Damages
While the elderly white men who run Britain’s Conservative Party chose between two deeply depressing choices for new leader, let’s take a minute to reckon just how much ruin the disgraced prime minister has inflicted on his country.
Read it
Los Angeles Review of Books · April 4th, 2022
“To Know No Nation Will Be Home”: A Conversation with Solmaz Sharif
An interview with Solmaz Sharif about her poetic journey, as well as why she couldn’t write much in the Trump years, and whether poetry can ever become a home to the displaced.
Read it
Los Angeles Review of Books · July 2nd, 2021
“America Is a Myth”: A Conversation with Natalie Diaz
An interview with poet Natalie Diaz, the first Latina to win the Pulitzer Prize, about her most recent collection, "Postcolonial Love Poem."
Read it
The Nation · June 4th, 2021
Covid-19 Is a Boon for UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Buds
The British government’s latest “test to travel” scheme is providing yet another opportunity for Conservative officials’ friends—like Randox founder Peter FitzGerald—to profit from the crisis.
Read it
In These Times · May 6th, 2021
Joe Biden Shouldn't Shy Away From the Radicalism of the New Deal
‘Why the New Deal Matters’ author Eric Rauchway explains why embracing FDR’s signature programs is not just a moral imperative—it’s good politics.
Read it
In These Times · March 30th, 2021
The UK's Vaccine Rollout Is the Latest Reminder We Need Universal Healthcare
Britain’s vaccination rate has far outpaced the rest of the West. The triumph belongs to its National Health Service.
Read it
Los Angeles Review of Books · March 23rd, 2021
Family Separation by Any Other Name: On Patricia Engel’s “Infinite Country”
A review of "Infinite Country," the new novel by Patricia Engel, which serves as a reminder that family separation is a long, shameful bipartisan legacy.
Read it
Los Angeles Review of Books · January 6th, 2021
“The World Wakes Up, Enlarged”: A Conversation with Dan Chiasson
An interview with the New Yorker poetry critic and Wellesley professor about his latest book "The Math Campers," poetry in a pandemic, and America's youth awakening.
Read it
Los Angeles Review of Books · November 30th, 2020
Antidotes to Brexit, COVID-19, and Other Afflictions in Ali Smith’s Seasonal Quartet
Ali Smith's four novels powerfully capture living British history through intimate relationships playing out before the backdrop of sociopolitical turmoil in both the past and present.
Read it
The Nation · October 5th, 2020
Extinction Rebellion’s Long Overdue Reckoning With Race
After experiencing a barrage of criticism for its lack of diversity, has the climate activist group finally made inclusivity a priority?
Read it
The Nation · June 22nd, 2020
How to Destroy a National Health Service
Over several decades, a toxic combination of underfunding and stealth privatization efforts have brought Britain’s widely beloved NHS to its knees
Read it
The Nation · April 20th, 2020
How Brexit Infected Britain’s Coronavirus Response
Boris Johnson’s government keeps promising to “Get Brexit Done,” even as the deadly pandemic ravages the country.
Read it
Truthdig · October 4th, 2019
Sara Nelson Is the Face of America's Resurgent Labor Movement
The flight attendant who made national headlines during the government shutdown as she called for a general strike now wants labor’s top job.
Read it
Truthdig · July 15th, 2019
I Know What It’s Like to Be Told to ‘Go Back’ to My Own Country
As the daughter of Iranian and Mexican immigrants, the president’s racist attacks on four congresswomen of color have struck me to my core.
Read it
Truthdig · April 22nd, 2019
The Most Horrifying Look at Monsanto Yet
Samanta Schweblin has terrified readers across the globe precisely because she tells familiar stories we should all dread.
Read itContact
Feel free to reach out at natashahakimizapata@gmail.com
Follow her on Instagram at @natashakimizapata, Twitter/X at @natashakimiz or Facebook.