Courtesy photo.
SUMMARY
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UCSB Arts & Lectures presents Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists and authors Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn for Tales of Hope on the American Landscape
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Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn have co-written the bestselling books Half the Sky, A Path Appears, China Wakes, Thunder From the East, and most recently,Tightrope
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First husband-wife team to win a Pulitzer Prize for journalism for their coverage of China’s Tiananmen Square democracy movement
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Kristof was the first blogger on The New York Times website
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Newsweek cited Sheryl WuDunn as one of the “150 Women Who Shake the World”
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This presentation is part of the 2021-2022 CREATING HOPE programming initiative
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Thursday, February 17th / 7:30 p.m. Pacific / Campbell Hall
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$25 – $40: General Public / $10 for UCSB Students (Current student ID required)
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Health & Safety: Proof of full vaccination is required for all attendees. Proof of booster vaccination will be required for all eligible attendees beginning February 4, 2022. Masks are required indoors at all times. N95, KN95, KF94 or FFP2 face masks are strongly recommended. Regardless of the mask type, it is only effective if it is worn over your mouth and nose. Visithttps://artsandlectures.ucsb.edu/SeasonFAQs/ for updates and further details.
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Tickets/Info: (805) 893-3535, www.ArtsAndLectures.UCSB.edu
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This event includes an at-home viewing option (live stream only; no replay).
“Individually, Kristof and WuDunn are extraordinarily knowledgeable; collectively, they are untouchable.” The Miami Herald
UCSB Arts & Lectures presents Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists and authors Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn for Tales of Hope on the American Landscape onThursday, February 17th at 7:30 p.m. Pacific at Campbell Hall. This presentation is part of the 2021-2022 CREATING HOPE programming initiative.
Renowned for their relentless chronicling of human rights abuses and giving a voice to the voiceless, Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn have co-written the bestselling books Half the Sky, A Path Appears, China Wakes, Thunder From the East and most recently, Tightrope. Together, they won a Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of China’s Tiananmen Square democracy movement. Their work is the subject of two full programs created by Oprah Winfrey and has inspired multiple PBS documentary series. More recently, Kristof left The New York Times to run for governor of Oregon to address pragmatic problems like homelessness and addiction that afflict his hometown. The husband-wife team will discuss what they learned while researching Tightrope and their reflections on the political landscape in Oregon and America today.
ABOUT NICHOLAS KRISTOF
??How good do you really have to be, to be christened the reporter’s reporter…by other reporters? You have to be Nicholas Kristof – good. After working in France, Kristof began backpacking in Africa and Asia, writing articles to cover his expenses. He’s lived on four continents, reported on six and traveled to more than 150 countries. During his travels, he has caught malaria, experienced wars, confronted warlords, encountered an Indonesian mob carrying heads on pikes and survived an African airplane crash. Kristof not only managed to survive and press on, he also won two Pulitzers in the process – advocating human rights and giving a voice, to the voiceless.
In 1990 Kristof and his wife, Sheryl WuDunn, then also a New York Times journalist, became the
first husband-wife team to win a Pulitzer Prize for journalism for their coverage of China’s Tiananmen Square democracy movement. Kristof won his second Pulitzer in 2006 for what the judges called “his graphic, deeply reported columns that, at personal risk, focused attention on genocide in Darfur and that gave voice to the voiceless in other parts of the world.” Kristof and WuDunn have written five best-selling books: Tightrope, Half the Sky, A Path Appears, China Wakes and Thunder from the East. Oprah Winfrey devoted two full programs to their work, and they have been on countless other television programs. Half the Sky and A Path Appears each inspired a prime-time PBS documentary series.
In their new book, Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope (2020), they issue a plea to address the crisis in working-class America, while also focusing on solutions to mend a half century of governmental failure. Archbishop Desmond Tutu dubbed Kristof as “an honorary African” for his reporting on conflicts there. President Bill Clinton said, “There is no one in journalism, anywhere in the United States at least, who has done anything like the work he has done to figure out how poor people are actually living around the world, and what their potential is.”
After joining The New York Times in 1984, Kristof served as a correspondent in Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Beijing, and Tokyo. He has covered presidential politics, interviewed everyone from President Obama to Iranian President Ahmadinejad, and was the first blogger on The New York Times website. A documentary about him, Reporter, executive-produced by Ben Affleck, aired on HBO, and he has millions of followers on Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Kristof has won innumerable awards including the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, the Anne Frank Award and the Fred Cuny Award for Prevention of Armed Conflict. He also serves on the board of Harvard University and the Association of American Rhodes Scholars.
Jeffrey Toobin of CNN, his Harvard classmate, said of Kristof: “I’m not surprised to see him emerge as the moral conscience of our generation of journalists. I am surprised to see him as the Indiana Jones of our generation of journalists.” George Clooney, said himself, that he became engaged in Sudan after reading Kristof columns, and traveled with Kristof to the fringes of Darfur – rooming with him on the floor of a cheap hotel – motivating Clooney to make this video of Kristof: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agLP0hTUC9k
As a speaker, Nicholas Kristof always keeps audiences on the edge of their seats with his moving storytelling and incomparable insights into the events that shape our world. Audiences are captivated by his global adventures and leave inspired to drive change, take on challenges and make a difference. As one lecture series attested, “You could hear a pin drop in the auditorium because he was spellbinding.”
ABOUT SHERYL WUDUNN
Sheryl WuDunn, the first Asian-American reporter to win a Pulitzer Prize, is a business executive and best-selling author. She co-founded FullSky Partners, a consulting firm focusing on double-bottom line ventures in new media, technology and healthcare services. She is also a venture partner at Piedmont Partners Group Ventures, which invests in growth companies in the U.S.
Previously, Ms. WuDunn has been vice president in the investment management division at Goldman, Sachs & Co. and a commercial loan officer at Bankers Trust. She is also one of a small handful of people who have worked at The New York Times both as an executive and journalist: in management roles in both the strategic planning and circulation sales departments at The Times; as editor for international markets, energy and industry; as The Times’s first anchor of an evening news headlines program for a digital cable TV channel, the Discovery-Times; and as a foreign correspondent for The Times in Tokyo and Beijing, where she wrote about economic, financial, political and social issues. In 2011, Ms. WuDunn was also a Senior Lecturer at Yale University’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs where she taught about challenges facing China.
She has been a Hauser Visiting Leader at the Harvard Kennedy School in 2017 and 2018. With her husband, Nicholas D. Kristof, Ms. WuDunn is co-author of their new book, Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope (2020), which chronicles the different struggles facing working-class America. This story is told, in part, by following the lives of some of the children whom Kristof grew up with, and why one quarter died prematurely in adulthood while others had journeys of resurgence involving recovery and commitment to helping those less fortunate. In addition, they co-wrote A Path Appears: Transforming Lives, Creating Opportunity, a New York Times best-selling book about altruism and how to bring about change in our society using evidence-based strategies. Published in late 2014 by Knopf, A Path Appears was turned into a three-part PBS documentary airing in January and February 2015 and was featured oN numerous network television shows. They also co-authored Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, a No. 1 New York Times best-selling book about the challenges facing women around the globe, published in 2009 by Knopf and featured on The Oprah Winfrey Show and The Colbert Report, among other shows. Ms. WuDunn also helped launch the development of the Half the Sky multi-platform digital effort that included a highly popular documentary series that aired on PBS in October 2012, mobile games and an online social media game on Facebook that hit No. 9 in its second week on the platform.
Ms. WuDunn has co-authored two other best-selling books aboutAsia: Thunder from the East and China Wakes. She won a Pulitzer Prize with her husband for covering China, along with the Dayton Literary Peace Prize for Lifetime Achievement. She has also won other journalism prizes, including the George Polk Award and Overseas Press Club awards. Ms. WuDunn has also won a White House Project EPIC award, and she has been a judge for the State Department “Secretary’s Innovation Award for Women’s and Girls’ Empowerment.” She has won other awards, including the Asia Women in Business Corporate Leadership Award, the Pearl S. Buck Woman of the Year Award, and the Harriet Beecher Stowe Prize, among numerous other awards.
In 2011, Newsweek cited Ms. WuDunn as one of the “150 Women Who Shake the World.” In 2012, she was selected as one of 60 notable members of the League of Extraordinary Women by Fast Company magazine. In 2013, she was included as one of the “leading women who make America” in the PBS documentary, The Makers. She was also featured in a 2013 Harvard Business School film about prominent women who graduated from HBS. In August 2015, Business Insider named her one of the 31 most successful graduates of the Harvard Business School.
See A&L’s full 2022 lineup here
This is a moment that calls for Optimism, Resilience, Courage and Vision.
Santa Barbara needs Hope, and Arts & Lectures is uniquely positioned to respond.
A&L’s 2021-2022 CREATING HOPE programming initiative has already inspired our community with presentations by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, chef Jose? Andre?s and author Anne Lamott. We will continue to inspire, through shared experiences with thought leaders, creative problem solvers and arts visionaries who will guide us forward. CREATING HOPE programs strengthen human connection, promote emotional well-being, joy and compassion, and envision positive change. Learn more about the CREATING HOPE:https://artsandlectures.ucsb.edu/CreatingHope.aspx
ABOUT UCSB ARTS & LECTURES
Founded in 1959, UCSB Arts & Lectures (A&L) is the largest and most influential arts and lectures organization between Los Angeles and San Francisco. A&L annually presents more than a hundred public events, from critically acclaimed concerts and dance performances by world-renowned artists to talks by groundbreaking authors and film series at UCSB and Santa Barbara-area venues. With a mission to “educate, entertain and inspire,” A&L also oversees an outreach program that brings visiting artists and speakers into local classrooms and other venues for master classes, open rehearsals, discussions and more, serving K-12 students, college students and the general public.
Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn is presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures.
This presentation is part of the 2021-2022 CREATING HOPE programming initiative.
$25 – $40: General Public / $10 for UCSB Students (Current student ID required)
For tickets and more information, call UCSB Arts & Lectures at (805) 893-3535 or visit www.ArtsAndLectures.UCSB.edu.
Presented in association with Leading From Within
Special Thanks:
UCSB Arts & Lectures gratefully acknowledges our Community Partners the Natalie Orfalea Foundation & Lou Buglioli for their generous support of the 2021-2022 season.
