Here's Why Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson Wore Cowrie Shells to the Inauguration
The Justice's choice of attire was a small act of resistance.
Published Jan. 22 2025, 10:36 a.m. ET
It's traditional for Supreme Court justices to attend the inauguration of the next president, and one is usually responsible for making sure that the president takes the oval office. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was therefore president for Donald Trump's 2025 inauguration, and many called attention to what she was wearing at the ceremony.
After Jackson's cowrie shells got called out repeatedly online, some people wanted to know what they meant. Here's what we know.
What did Ketanji Brown Jackson's inauguration cowrie shells mean?
While Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson has not explained why she decided to wear cowrie shells, many fashion experts interpreted the decision to wear the small glossy shells on her collar and in her earrings as a reflection of the moment she was in.
“In many African traditions, cowrie shells are believed to carry protective properties and spiritual significance,” fashion historian Shelby Ive Christie told HuffPost.
“They’re often seen as conduits of ancestral wisdom and protection, used in divination practices and spiritual ceremonies," she continued.
Christie also added that the formal way the shells were arranged signified a certain level of formality and ceremony, and that the shells were often used as currency in Africa. Jackson is not the first Black woman to have donned the shells in public, with everyone from Alicia Keys to Michelle Obama also choosing to wear them.
“This design brilliantly reinterprets the traditional judicial jabot through an African-American cultural lens,” Christie added. “The cascading arrangement of shells mirrors the formal neckpiece typically worn by Supreme Court justices, but reimagines it using elements deeply rooted in African and African American aesthetic traditions.”
In addition to signaling an act of rebellion, the shells also signify the way Jackson is navigating this professional space by asserting her own identity.
Some were underwhelmed by this small act of defiance.
While plenty of people offered praise for Jackson's outfit, and for the way it seemed to represent an act of defiance against the incoming administration, there were also those who felt the gesture signified the way many Democrats will symbolically resist Trump's administration without actually doing anything significant.
"This is just about the maximum level of resistance and pushback we can expect from the democrats to the trump administration. Might get some finger-wagging and tut-tutting too. Inspiring stuff," one person wrote in response to a post explaining the significance behind Jackson's outfit.
"... We're gonna need more cowrie shells... A *LOT* more cowrie shells..." another person added.
It's not clear how Jackson was supposed to resist in this moment, but the gesture did ring hollow for some.
At the moment, though, Jackson is one of just three liberal justices sitting on an overwhelmingly conservative court, and so she is very often dissenting in the court's most serious cases. If liberals want resistance to Trump, they need to remember that Jackson can only do so much in her role, whether they appreciate her fashion choices or not. Symbolism isn't everything, but these kinds of gestures aren't meaningless either.