by Deborah Charles | 5 Jan 2021 | Americas, Donald Trump, Eyewitness, Future of Democracy, Government, Joe Biden
Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the U.S. presidential election and COVID-19 ensure an uneasy transfer of power to President-elect Joe Biden. U.S. President-elect Donald J. Trump shakes hands with Vice President Joe Biden as he arrives for his inauguration on...
by Joy Chinaza | 9 Dec 2020 | Africa, African Leadership Academy, Contest winners, Educators' Catalog, Eyewitness, Future of Democracy, Human Rights, Personal Reflections, Politics, Student Posts, Youth Voices
I joined protests against police brutality in my home country of Nigeria and saw them almost become a war, then a rude awakening for youth. Protesters in Umuahia, Nigeria, October 2020 (All photos courtesy of Eje Studios) This story was a runner-up in News...
Joy Chinaza takes us into the streets of Nigeria to join young people protesting against police brutality. Like youth elsewhere this year, she is driven by anger over rights abuses perpetrated by police charged with protecting civilians but who instead turn weapons against minorities. A shared sense of injustice motivates Chinaza and millions of others around the globe, making her story a metaphor for youthful outrage. But the personal details in the tale by the African Leadership Academy student, including the beating her own brother suffers, add poignancy that sets her account apart. Make sure students note how the first-person pronoun draws them into the story. And how her outrage — so common among youth — is tinged with ambiguity at the end.
by Gene Gibbons | 24 Nov 2020 | Americas, Educators' Catalog, Eyewitness, Government, Joe Biden, Personal Reflections
Joe Biden and I grew up in the same city. He was upright in school and on the playground. He’ll be a caring leader as U.S. president. U.S. President-elect Joe Biden visiting his childhood home in Scranton, Pennsylvania, 23 October 2019 (Jason Farmer/The...
A lot of ink has been spilled about Joe Biden’s background, but how many authors played sandlot baseball with the U.S. President-elect? News Decoder correspondent Gene Gibbons covered six presidents while at Reuters, but he grew up with Biden, and his reminiscences of their upbringing in Pennsylvania capture key qualities of the next U.S. leader. It’s the details — the nicknames the schoolmarm gave her students, Biden’s phone call to the same teacher — that enliven the story. Without hyperbole or boasting, Gibbons tells a story that packs a punch and highlights Biden’s journey from a vacant lot — “mostly dirt and cinders” — to the White House.
by Helen Womack | 6 Oct 2020 | Eyewitness, Human Rights, Identity
Millions of people around the world are stateless, with no rights and condemned to living in the shadows, on the margins of society. A Muslim Rohingya boy inside a shelter at an internally displaced person camp near the capital of Sittwe, Myanmar, 9 March 2017...
by Enrique Shore | 15 Sep 2020 | Eyewitness, Media Literacy
Technology has revolutionized news photos since I launched my career decades ago. But the maxim “always be prepared” still holds true. All photos by Enrique Shore “Luck is when opportunity meets preparation.” So said Manuel León Lopez, my photojournalism...
by Jonathan Sharp | 8 Sep 2020 | Eyewitness, Media Literacy
Good journalists try to remain neutral. I once hopped on a U.S. military helicopter during the Vietnam War. Had I abandoned my principles? U.S. troops during Operation Lam Son 719, February 1971. This photo was on the last roll of film received from Associated Press...
by Jonathan Sharp | 26 Aug 2020 | China, Eyewitness
When I arrived in Hong Kong half a century ago, it was just starting its explosive growth. Now it’s caught again in the middle of a big-power dispute. Before Hong Kong’s old airport closed in 1998, it had just one runway, and airliners used to skim low...
by Ben Barber | 28 May 2020 | Asia, Eyewitness, Islam, Nationalism, Terrorism
I was in Afghanistan when mujahideen guerrillas fought Soviet invaders. Three decades later, security remains precarious and peace a distant dream. Men walking from the Pakistan border into Afghan territory abandoned by Soviet-backed Afghan forces in 1988 (All photos...
by Savannah Jenkins | 2 Apr 2020 | Discovery, Eyewitness, Personal Reflections, Podcasts
COVID-19 has forced billions of people into lockdown. Two survivors of earlier crises tell how solidarity and patience are antidotes to fear. Patients receive blood transfusions in Karachi, Pakistan, 1 April 2020. A lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic has created...
by News Decoder | 19 Mar 2020 | Discovery, Eyewitness, Health and Wellness
COVID-19 is forcing us to adapt to rapidly evolving circumstances. Two News-Decoder correspondents recount their challenges. People stand in designated areas in an elevator as a social distancing effort, Surabaya, Indonesia, 19 March 2020 (AP Photo/Trisnadi) Two of...