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Black Lives Matter
Also written: #BlackLivesMatter, BLM
capitalization-ruleproper-nounevolving-usage
At a glance
Source-by-source
“A movement founded in 2013 in response to the lack of justice for Trayvon Martin. Their mission is to eradicate white supremacy and build local power to intervene in violence inflicted on Black communities by the state and vigilantes …”
Color of Change's protest-reporting language guide gives Black Lives Matter a dedicated definition, framing it as a movement founded in 2013 with a stated mission. It separately distinguishes the Black Lives Matter Network from the broader Movement for Black Lives coalition, so writers don't conflate the two.
“A civil rights movement that started after the July 2013 acquittal of George Zimmerman in the Florida shooting death of African-American teen Trayvon Martin. The Black Lives Matter movement, also written #BlackLivesMatter, was started as a Twitter hashtag by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi …”
The Diversity Style Guide's dedicated entry traces the movement's origin to the 2013 Zimmerman acquittal and names its three founders, recording that it is also written as the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter. The entry notes the movement opposes police violence against Black people and, per its own website, does not hold that Black lives matter more than others.
“A political movement to address systemic and state violence against African Americans.”
Racial Equity Tools defines Black Lives Matter as a political movement against systemic and state violence, then quotes the movement's own founders at length, sourcing the language directly to the Black Lives Matter "Herstory" page rather than paraphrasing it.
“An ideological and political intervention in a world where Black lives are systematically and intentionally targeted for demise. It is an affirmation of Black humanity, Black contributions to society, and Black resilience in the face of deadly oppression.”
The Movement Strategy Center glossary carries a dedicated entry that pairs an ideological framing of Black Lives Matter with a factual one, also dating the political movement to 2013 and naming its three founders. Its language echoes the movement's own self-description.
Audience notes
- Journalists and editors
- Capitalize Black Lives Matter as a proper-noun movement; the hashtag form is #BlackLivesMatter (camel-case, no spaces). All four sources date the movement to 2013; three of the four — the Diversity Style Guide, Racial Equity Tools, and the Movement Strategy Center — name founders Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi. Get the founding date and, where you name them, the founders' names right when sourcing.
- Communicators and campaigners
- Distinguish the movement from the organizations within it. Color of Change separates the Black Lives Matter Network from the broader Movement for Black Lives coalition; "Black Lives Matter" as a movement is not interchangeable with any single named organization or chapter network.
- When quoting the movement's own framing
- Racial Equity Tools and the Movement Strategy Center both lean on the movement's self-description from its "Herstory" page. When you want the movement's own words, source them to blacklivesmatter.com rather than paraphrasing a definition into your own voice.
Synthesis
The four sources agree on the basics and add no dissent. Each treats Black
Lives Matter as a real, capitalized, proper-noun movement, not a phrase to
hedge or avoid, and each dates its founding to 2013, in the wake of the
acquittal in Trayvon Martin’s killing. Three of the four (the Diversity Style
Guide, Racial Equity Tools, and the Movement Strategy Center) name the same
three founders: Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi. Color of
Change’s protest-reporting entry dates the movement to 2013 without naming
them. The Diversity Style Guide is
the only one to spell out the orthography directly, recording that the
movement “is also written #BlackLivesMatter,” with the hashtag camel-cased,
unspaced, and capitalized to mirror the movement name.
Where the sources differ is in register rather than position. Racial Equity
Tools and the Movement Strategy Center quote or echo the movement’s own
self-description (the “Herstory” framing, “an ideological and political
intervention”), letting the movement speak for itself. Color of Change, a
protest-reporting guide, is the most operationally precise: it gives Black
Lives Matter a definition and then, in a separate entry, distinguishes the
Black Lives Matter Network from the broader Movement for Black Lives
coalition, the movement-versus-organization line that trips up newsrooms.
The Diversity Style Guide sits between, supplying the fullest journalistic
chronology and noting the movement’s own clarification that it does not hold
Black lives to matter more than others.
All four date from 2020 or later. Color of Change’s guide
landed in November 2020, months after the George Floyd protests had pushed
major newsrooms to capitalize Black and to treat Black Lives Matter as an
established proper noun; the other three are 2023–2024 references. None of them debates
whether to capitalize or whether the movement is legitimate subject matter;
that question was settled in practice by the time these guides were written.
What they offer instead is precision: correct founding date, correct
founders, correct hashtag form, and the distinction between the movement and
the organizations operating under its banner.
Audience notes
See the structured audience notes above: journalists should capitalize the
movement and render the hashtag as #BlackLivesMatter while getting the 2013
founding and the three founders right; communicators should keep the movement
distinct from the Black Lives Matter Network and the wider Movement for Black
Lives; and anyone quoting the movement’s framing should source it to
blacklivesmatter.com rather than paraphrasing.
Related terms