Kim Pearson

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  1. I Marched for the Martin Luther King Holiday

    1/15/12 9:53pm by Kim Pearson
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    Martin Luther King, from Wikimedia commons

    Early on the crisp, clear morning of January 15, 1981, I boarded a bus in Princeton, New Jersey bound for a demonstration in Washington, DC to make the birthdate of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. a national holiday. Via the Associated Press, the New York Times reported the next day that about 15,000 of us  "walked along Pennsylvania Avenue from the Capitol the Washington Monument, carrying signs that read, 'Let's make this day a day of celebration - Happy Birthday to Martin Luther King' and 'I Have a Dream - for Peace.'"  Read more >

  2. Hillary Clinton's Next Act: Making Half the World's Leaders Women

    12/20/11 1:00am by Kim Pearson
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    Hillary Clinton

    The Women in Public Service Project, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's new initiative to shepherd a new generation of women into politics and policymaking around the globe, could prove to be the most significant public diplomacy move since the Kennedy Administration launched the Peace Corps fifty years ago.  Read more >

  3. With Its "Occupy" Coverage, Has Storify Become the "Backbone of News?"

    12/12/11 1:02pm by Kim Pearson
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    occupy minnesota protester

    About 15 years ago, the late legal scholar and civil rights attorney Derrick Bell published an allegorical tale about an uprising among women across the US that took the form of a mass simultaneous street performance of the electric slide.  Read more >

  4. A Rough-Hewn Kind of Beauty

    8/3/11 6:49am by Kim Pearson
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    Kim Pearson

    Some months ago, a phone conversation with my BlogHer colleague Rita Arens turned toward my experience of having ankylosing spondylitis, an arthritic condition that froze my spine over the course of 30 years, first into a ramrod pole and now into a shepherd's crook. With her encouragement, I jabbered on about how, along the way, I've loved and lost, borne and raised two children, managed a career and had bi-lateral hip replacements - two surgeries - a week apart, followed by single doses of radiation. Then Rita suggested that my story would be a good addition to the "Own Your Beauty" series.That shut me up.  Read more >

  5. New Dept. of Labor Guide Aims at Homeless Female Vets

    7/25/11 1:07pm by Kim Pearson
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    DPA via ZUMA Press.

    With the growing presence of women in the US Armed Forces comes the growing need for services for returning women veterans who find themselves unable to get a foothold in civilian life. Far too many female veterans end up homeless, and a new study by the US Department of Labor finds that too many of them feel that shelters and other support systems originally created for male veterans aren't for them.  Read more >

  6. "News of the World" Tabloid to Shut Down After Phone-Hacking Scandal

    7/7/11 2:53pm by Kim Pearson
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    News of the World Closes

    A big shoe dropped today in the ongoing scandal concerning allegations that the British newspaper News of the World hacked the cell phones of more than perhaps 4000 British celebrities, murder victims and ordinary citizens: the 168-year-old Sunday paper will print its last issue and close its doors this coming Sunday.  Read more >

  7. Indictment of Sen. John Edwards Spurs Legal Debate, Laments for Opportunities Lost

    6/3/11 12:20pm by Kim Pearson
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    John Edwards

    A federal grand jury handed down a six-count indictment today against former Senator and presidential candidate John Edwards that he illegally used campaign funds to cover up an extramarital affair.  Read more >

  8. How Parents and Teachers Should Teach Children About Slavery

    4/19/11 12:00pm by Kim Pearson
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    Nikko

    April 12, 2011 marked the 150th anniversary of the assault on Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, launching the United States into four years of bloody civil war. This year's anniversary has occasioned panels, debates, balls and a raft of commemorative activities. However, it has also presented challenges to educators and parents about how to teach children about this crucial but contentious time in ways that are both honest and sensitive. Of all the difficult issues surrounding the Civil War era, helping children understand slavery can be especially daunting.  Read more >

  9. CBS Reporter Lara Logan Hospitalized After "Brutal Sexual Assault" in Egypt

    2/16/11 8:52am by Kim Pearson
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    Lara Logan

    CBS News announced yesterday that Lara Logan, a star reporter known for her coverage of wars and crises, suffered a brutal beating and sexual assault last Friday while reporting on the crowds in Cairo's Tahrir Sqare celebrating the ouster of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.  Read more >

  10. This Black History Month, Explore the Legacy of the American Civil War

    2/6/11 10:15am by Kim Pearson
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    Alfre Woodward reading Sojourner Truth

    The 2011 Black History Month theme, African Americans and the Civil War, offers rich opportunities to anyone interested in the truth of American identity.The American Revolution set the effort to create a democracy in motion, but it was the Civil War of 1861-65 that responded to the critical contradiction at the heart of that Revolution: the idea that a state founded on the principle of equality could countenance the notion of one human being owning another.  Read more >

Kim Pearson

Full Name
Kim Pearson
Member Since
January 2006
About Me: 

I started out as a wee child with a love of magazines -- the old fashioned magazines with really good writing, such as Saturday Review or really powerful photoessays, such as Look., and of course, Ebony.  Because it was the 60s, and I was a little urban black girl from a working-class family with middle-class aspirations, these magazines were in our homes, and public affairs show were constantly on our television. I started writing essays when I was eight years old and thought that one day I would be like James Baldwin, facing down William F. Buckley and cutting him to quick with my rhetorical brilliance. This of course was after I inferred that becoming an astronaut was probably out of the question (which I why I cried when Mae Jemison went up on the space shuttle.) Well, I never wrote for Norman Cousins, but I have written for a bunch of other magazines, and while I didn't become an astronaut, I have been a science writer. In addition, I teach writing for journalism and interactive multimedia at The College of New Jersey.I used to blog at Professor Kim's News Notes; now I write about my research at KimPearson.net. In my BlogHer posts for the law and journalism/media sections, I'm likely to pick up on issues involving civil rights, civil liberties the evolving business trends in the media business. I'm also interested in how members of under-represented groups gain access to the public square. Enough about me -- I look forward to your ideas, critiques and leads!

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