PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Freelance Writer, Editor, and Photographer 
1997 – 2000, 2002 – present
Edit, report, review, fact check, and take pictures for magazines, newspapers, and websites.

• Write articles, interviews, and reviews for newspapers, magazine, and websites including Britannica.com and Gotham Gazette and Extra!
• Take pictures for The Chief, the newspaper for New York's civil employees.
• Fact check materials for Reader's Digest, Meredith Corporation (magazine publishers), and other publications.
• Edited culture section and wrote for In These Times, an independent newsmagazine focusing on national and international politics and culture.  Hired writers, edited book, film, music and television reviews and “In The End” feature.  Created layout of section pages and instituted short reviews to cover more of the current political literature.
• Developed a personal website, posting current and past articles and photos.

Research Editor
Reader’s Digest, Pleasantville, New York
2000 - 2002
Verified accuracy of articles and provided original reporting using scholarly studies, the Internet, libraries, and interviews with experts and subjects of stories.  Reported and wrote short articles.

• Developed network of psychologists and statisticians as well as online and library resources to provide in-depth research and writing quickly for a new department about relationships.
• Gained expertise in medical and legal research to provide precise, well-founded fact-checking and original reporting on complex issues.

Editor
Southern Exposure, Durham, North Carolina
1994 – 1997
Edited quarterly magazine of regional politics and culture.  Developed special issues focusing on aspects of Southern life, assigned and edited stories, supervised editorial staff, worked with freelance writers, photographers, artists, designers and printers, wrote articles, and took photographs.

• Published groundbreaking investigative reports on the burning of black churches in the South, on the impact of the property rights movement, censorship of the arts, and campaign finance abuses.
• Highlighted often-overlooked aspects of Southern life by creating special issues on arts, environment, and the image of the South

Editor
East Tennessee State University, Johnson City, Tennessee
1986 -1994
Edited Appalachian magazines, Now and Then, and a scholarly publication, Journal of the Appalachian Studies Association.  Assigned and edited stories, wrote articles, took photographs, supervised editorial staff, created layout and design.

• Developed Now and Then from a department newsletter into a high-quality, highly respected and influential regional magazine by and for scholars including historians, social scientists, writers, photographers, students, political activists, and others interested in Appalachia.
• Created special focus issues—on veterans, children, education, media, and other areas of mountain life—which are regularly used in classrooms and have generated further research by regional studies’ scholars.

EDUCATION

Marshall University
Huntington, West Virginia
Regents B.A., concentration on journalism and photography

East Tennessee State University
Johnson City, Tennessee
Additional 21 undergraduate hours, photography and Spanish

SELECTED ARTICLES, PHOTOGRAPHS, AND PERFORMED WORK

• Feature, “New York Times Bylines Sideline Women,” Extra! July/August 2004,
  the publication of FAIR—Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting.
• Photos of public officials, interview subjects, press conferences, rallies, and other events for The Chief, New York City's public employees' newspaper, June 2003 to the present.
• Article and pictures for The Encyclopedia of Appalachia, forthcoming, University of Tennessee Press.
• Feature: “Shooting in New York,” from Gotham Gazette, February 23, 2004.
• Feature: “Obesity in the Schools,” from Gotham Gazette, November 24, 2003.
• Interview with playwright, performer and raconteur Jo Carson in a book of conversations with authors, University of Tennessee Press, forthcoming, summer 2006. Originally published in Iron Mountain Review, 1998
• "Cancell'd Destiny," co-author (with Christine Murdock and Steve Giles) of a one-woman play based on the life of an East Tennessee teacher, by The Necessary Theatre, Louisville, Ky., May 2004. Produced by Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Va., February 1990, and by the Road Company professional touring theater, Johnson City, Tenn., February-March 1990, and for Regional Organization of Theaters South (ROOTS) festival, Atlanta, Ga.
• Now and Then Becomes a Then," Now and Then, winter 2003.
• Photograph of Lacey, a dog, for an article in the North Carolina Independent, September 24, 2003.
• Shorts for the Reader’s Digest “RD You” section, November and December 2001, January 2002 and June 2002.
• Technophilia and Its Discontents: An Interview with Ellen Ullman,” Britannica.com, August 30, 2000, discussion about impact of technology on human life.
• “Ms. Meets Bust,” Gazette-Mail (Charleston, W.Va.), June 27, 1999, feature comparing and contrasting two feminist magazines.
• “Another campaign for black vets,” News & Observer (Raleigh, N.C.), January 7, 1999, and “The Old South,” In These Times, March 21, 1999, articles about segregation in a Durham, NC, American Legion post.
• “A Road Closes,” In These Times, September 6, 1998, feature about the demise of a progressive touring theater company in the mountains.
• “Shut Up and Shut Down,” cover story on censored and de-funded art in the South, Southern Exposure, Winter 1996.
• “Crime in Appalachia,” co-author of article (with Norma Myers) in anthology, Appalachia Inside Out  (edited by Robert J. Higgs, Ambrose N. Manning and Jim Wayne Miller), University of Tennessee Press, Knoxville, 1995.
• Article on high rates of Cesareans in the South, Southern Exposure, fall 1994.
• “Sevier County, Tennessee,” in-depth investigation of impact of tourism in Smoky Mountain area, Now and Then, Spring 1991.
• Interview with novelist Lee Smith, Now and Then, Summer 1989.

SELECTED REVIEWS

• Sodom Laurel Album by Rob Amberg, University of North Carolina Press, in Now and Then, Winter 2002.
• Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver, HarperCollins, in News & Observer, November 19, 2000, and in Philosophy & Geography, V. 4, #1, February 2001.
• Gap Creek by Robert Morgan, Algonquin Press, in News & Observer, October 3, 1999 and in Now and Then, Spring 2001 (also quoted on book cover).
• Rebels in White Gloves: Coming of Age with Hillary's Class--Wellesley ’69 by Miriam Horn, Times Books; in News & Observer, June 27, 1999.
• The World Through a Monocle: The New Yorker at Midcentury by Mary F. Corey, in News & Observer, April 18, 1999.
• In Sam We Trust: The Untold Story of Sam Walton and How Wal-Mart Is Devouring America by Bob Ortega, Times Books, in News & Observer, November 15, 1998.
• The Father of Spin: Edward Bernays & the Birth of Public Relations by Larry Tye, Crown, in News & Observer, August 9, 1998.
• Landing Zones: Southern Veterans Remember Vietnam by James R. Wilson, Duke University Press; Appalachian Journal, Volume 19, Number 1, Fall 1991.
• Reviews have also appeared in the Gazette-Mail, Workbook, North Carolina Arts Journal, Johnson City (Tenn.) Press Chronicle, Herald Dispatch (Huntington, W.Va.), Southern Exposure, and Now and Then, 1984-2002.

ASSOCIATIONS

• Founding Board Chair, Independent Press Association, 1996
• Chair, Publications Committee, Appalachian Consortium Press, 1989-1992
• Member, Program and Steering Committee, Appalachian Studies Association, 1990-1991