Friday night I had the privilege of attending the James Aronson
Awards here at Hunter College. The James Aronson Award for Social Justice
Journalism has been given since 1990 by Hunter College to honor journalism
professor James Aronson. Aside from being a beloved professor, Aronson
was also a renowned journalist and founded The
National Guardian, a leftist newspaper created in the late 1940s.
As written on the Aronson Award's official website, the award (in so many words) honors innovative and
original U.S. media reports that shed light upon
sweeping social inequities such as discrimination, exploitation, violations of
human rights, etc. The judging panel is made up of a prominent and
reputable group of media aficionados including members of the Hunter
College Department of Film & Media Studies and a select committee of
various journalists and media critics.
There are winners from 3 categories: journalism, documentary, and
cartooning. This year's winners for journalism included Jessica Bruder, Sari Horwitz, Jonathan Jones
and T. Christian Miller, Andrea McDaniels, and various USA Today reporters. For the
documentary category, the winners were both Nathan Fitch and Sam
Feder. Finally, in the "Cartooning with a Conscience" category,
was cartoonist Adam Zyglis.
Being in the same room as these winners and
hearing their stories of simultaneous inspiration and struggle while creating
and reporting their pieces was really quite moving. Each piece dealt with
topics that were really deep and disheartening but at the same time excruciatingly educational. While I can imagine that attending this event was most useful and
stimulating for students who are aspiring journalists, I was so glad that I was
able to attend. Although I may not be a journalism major, baring witness to these people's hard
work and seeing them be rewarded for it made me want to do great things and be
the best that I can be at whatever I choose to be as well!
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