Journalism students at Miami Lakes Educational Center recently won a Skype call with Nicholas Kristof, Pulitzer-prize winning author and opinion columnist for the New York Times, through his email newsletter contest.
Kristof was raised in Yamhill, Oregon; a place that he describes as “in the middle of nowhere.” Through this middle of nowhere, however, he found his calling: Journalism.
“My journalism career began by total accident – I was in the 8th grade, and a bunch of people at my grade school decided that they wanted to make a newspaper.”
Kristoff didn’t even show up to the first organizational meeting, but after a surplus of writers and no editors to be found, he was picked to be an editor. He continued working with local newspapers through middle school and high school, and in college worked for several newspapers, including The Washington Post. However, Kristof was very nearly something completely different: A lawyer.
“I went to law school, and I was in great danger of becoming a lawyer, but, fortunately, I escaped that fate and I ended up writing for The New York Times.”
Although he began covering economics for the Times, he has spent the majority of his career as an Asian foreign correspondent. Kristof is perhaps most known for his work concerning human rights, a career that began after his Pulitzer-prize earning coverage of the Tiananmen Square protests.
“I covered the student democracy movement, and one night at Tiananmen Square, the army just came and mowed people down–I was so heartbroken, so outraged, but witnesses said they’d seen thousands of students killed. I was a witness, I was there, and I knew that wasn't what happened.”
Kristof said, “As a journalist, you have to side with the truth –it’s very human to exaggerate the scale and brutality of what happened: perpetrators lie and exaggerate, but so do victims.”
After 2001, Kristof has been writing opinion columns, mostly dealing with humanitarian issues, particularly women’s rights – a topic that has been important to him since the start of his journalism career back in middle school.
“My first editorial got me in a real bunch of trouble because it was about how girls couldn’t wear blue jeans in my school, but after a few articles, the restrictions were finally relaxed.”
Kristof’s work also includes a book he co-authored with his wife, Pulitzer-prize winning Sheryl WuDunn, about women’s issues in the developing world titled Half the Sky.
When asked if he considered himself an activist or a journalist, Kristof responded that he was “a mix of both.”
“People congratulate me on being an activist and I worry because activists don’t pursue the truth, and I always want to pursue the truth.
“As a journalist, I’m in the lighting business – if I shine my spotlight on something that needs attention, then maybe people will start paying attention and give the issue the help it needs.”
As a final piece of advice to students interested in pursuing journalism as a career, Kristof said: “There will always be a market for news and information in the world. The ability to communicate is always in demand. Also, keep reading!”