Princeton University’s Humanities Council and the Ferris Seminars in Journalism are pleased to announce the nine distinguished journalists who have been named visiting Ferris Professors for the 2017–2018 academic year. These writers and authors will come to Joseph Henry House straight from leading newsrooms, to teach an intensive seminar and contribute to the intellectual life of campus over the course of a semester.
The roster of visiting professors will join Joe Stephens, Ferris Professor of Journalism in Residence and a veteran investigative reporter for The Washington Post, as the Ferris program enters its 60th year.
The visiting Ferris Professors for Fall 2017:
—Deborah Amos covers the Middle East for NPR News and can be heard on Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition. Her course, International News: Migration Reporting, will include field work conducted among refugees in Canada and Connecticut.
—A Pulitzer Prize-winning senior editor who covers economic issues out of The Wall Street Journal’s Washington bureau, Bob Davis will stress storytelling while he teaches Politics and the Media: Writing about Washington and the Economy.
—Suki Kim is an investigative journalist, a novelist, and the author of New York Times best seller Without You, There Is No Us: Undercover Among the Sons of North Korea’s Elite. Her course on Creative Non-Fiction will focus on journalism as an art form.
—As a staff writer at The New Yorker, Rebecca Mead has profiled many subjects and written more than a hundred Talk of the Town stories. In The McGraw Seminar in Writing: The Art of the Profile, she will teach about a mainstay of magazine journalism.
—Joe Richman is founder and executive producer of Radio Diaries and a Peabody Award-winning producer and reporter. In his course, Audio Journalism: Storytelling for Radio Documentaries and Podcasts, students will produce a class podcast, among other projects.
—Before becoming CNNMoney’s national reporter for race and inequality in America, Tanzina Vega created and covered a beat on race and ethnicity for The New York Times. She will teach The Media and Social Issues: Reporting on Race in America Today.
In Spring 2018 the Ferris Seminars in Journalism will welcome the rest of the 2017–2018 cohort:
—A two-time recipient of the Pulitzer Prize, Jim Dwyer has spent most of his professional life reporting on New York City. He joined The New York Times in 2001 and has written the “About New York” column since 2007. He will teach a course on “The Literature of Fact” that integrates digital storytelling tools.
—Sarah Kaufman is The Washington Post’s Pulitzer Prize-winning dance critic and senior arts writer. She is also the author of The Art of Grace: On Moving Well Through Life. Her course will address writing about the arts, and the art of living.
—Michael LaForgia recently joined the investigative team of The New York Times. Previously the investigations editor at the Tampa Bay Times, he is also a two-time recipient of the Pulitzer Prize and will teach a course on the process of writing a traditional investigative story.
The spring term will also feature Stephens and John McPhee, Ferris Professor of Journalism in Residence and a staff writer at The New Yorker.
