Journalist – Historian – Speaker
The stats: 93 published columns. 66 at Pacific Standard 9 at CNN 5 at The Nation 4 at Washington Post 2 at The Ladders 1 at The Guardian 1 at The Atlantic 1 at Newsweek 1 at Eater 1 at The Establishment Writing is very different as a column. I’m grateful to Pacific Standard for bringing …
“On language and power” has been the tagline of How Did We Get Into This Mess? for years, so I’m always excited when other writers focus in on that specific issue. Here’s Summer Brennan, with her new twice-monthly column. I would like to invite readers to join me in doing this. Get a diary or journal …
Focus on Trump’s business. Follow the money. Ignore the tweets. Focus on Trump’s business. Follow the money. Ignore the tweets. Focus on Tru — David M. Perry (@Lollardfish) November 27, 2016 So I tweeted this during one of Trump’s latest online spewings. A lot of people shared it. Many responded, “Fuck you, asshole, I can …
I’m very excited to announced that I will be joining with Lawrence Carter-Long to offer a free webinar on disability and journalism on May 11, via The Poynter Institute. There are 56 million Americans who identify as disabled. Tens of millions more are connected to disability as direct caregivers or family members. Yet journalism about …
I spend a certain amount of my time critiquing reporting on disability: Inspiration porn, mercy killing discourse, how disability links to police use of force, and of course so much more. My basic premise is that journalism matters, language matters, and often the media fails to handle admittedly tricky topics very well. This is especially …
The Mighty is a well-funded website that publishes personal essays about disability. Narratives tend to be parent-driven or illness-driven, but they throw a huge amount of content out at the internet without much editorial oversight. The editors search through the vibrant disability-related blogosphere and ask to republish essays for free as well as publishing essays …
The National Center for Disability Journalism at Arizona State University has released a new style guide for writing about disability. Here’s the press release. There’s also a “words not to use” document. As a disability-rights journalist, I like the NCDJ a lot. They do great work and this is an important guide. These tools are …
Yesterday 11 Alive News Atlanta wrote a story about the murder of Dustin Hicks with the headline: “Dawsonville mother kills son, self, in possible mercy killing.” They followed that with the lede: “Murder-suicide or mercy killing?” As social media began to comment on the phrase, the headline changed to “Dawsonville mother shoots disabled son, self.” …
Rose Eveleth has become one of my favorite writers on technology. Lately, she’s been focusing specifically on prosthetics. It’s an area that technology is rapidly transforming. It’s great to have deeply thoughtful journalists reporting on both the science and the social implications. In this blog post, she reflects on what she’s learned on her beat …
Arizona State University hosts the National Center for Disability Journalism, an excellent group doing important work. The NCDJ offers the only annual journalism award for Disability issues – the Katherine Schneider Journalism Award for Excellence in Reporting on Disability – and have announced the 2015 winners. A ProPublica story that uncovered the shocking ways children …