Please join us for a conversation about the State of Newspaper Journalism featuring David Menconi, Steven Petrow and Lisa Sorg! This event is on Saturday, February 22nd at 12pm (HQ Raleigh).
David Menconi is a music critic/arts reporter at the Raleigh (NC) News & Observer, his professional address since 1991.
In addition to writing for various other publications on the side, he is also co-editor of the American Music Series for University of Texas Press, which published “Ryan Adams: Losering, A Story of Whiskeytown” in 2012. UT Press published his latest book in October 2015, “Comin’ Right at Ya: How a Jewish Yankee Hippie Went Country, or, the Often Outrageous History of Asleep at the Wheel.“
His next book will be a history of North Carolina music, tentatively scheduled for publication in 2019 on the University of North Carolina Press.
Steven Petrow is an award-winning journalist and book author who is best known for his Washington Postand New York Times essays on aging, health, and civility. He’s also an opinion columnist for USA Today, where he writes about civil discourse and manners. “Steven has long been an eloquent voice for civility in public discourse, and such a voice is needed now more than ever,” editorial page editor Bill Sternberg said in a release. Steven’s 2019 TED Talk, “3 Ways to Practice Civility” has been viewed more than 1.6 million times and translated into 13 languages.
The most recent of his five books is Steven Petrow’s Complete Gay & Lesbian Manners. His next book, Stupid Things I Won’t Do When I’m Old, will be published in 2021. You’re likely to hear Steven when you turn on NPR’s “All Things Considered Weekend,” or one of your favorite — or least favorite — TV networks. Steven also served as the host and executive producer of “The Civilist,” a podcast from Public Radio International and North Carolina Public Radio WUNC.
Lisa Sorg is an award-winning environmental investigative reporter with NC Policy Watch, a nonprofit digital media outlet in Raleigh. A journalist for 26 years, Sorg has a keen interest not only in the environment, but also the social justice impacts of pollution and corporate malfeasance.She has won dozens of awards for her news, public service and investigative reporting, including the Henry Weathers Freedom of Information Award for her reporting on government transparency. Before arriving at NC Policy Watch, she was editor of INDY Week in Durham. Sorg also served as editor of the San Antonio Current, in Texas, and at dailies and an alt-weekly in her home state of Indiana. There, she became interested in environmental reporting when she began covering PCB contamination at Superfund sites near low-income neighborhoods in Bloomington, Indiana. She lives in Durham, where in her off hours, she spends as much as time as possible outdoors.
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