RESOURCES:
New York Times: Archived Work by Anastasia Tsioulcas
Introducing the Knight-Wallace Arts Journalism Fellowship
TRANSCRIPTION:
Caroline MacGregor: You're listening to 89.1 WEMU. I'm Caroline McGregor, and my guest today is Anastasia Tsioulcas. She is a correspondent on NPR's Culture Desk and contributes as a classical music critic to the New York Times. She's the first journalist to hold such a dual role. We're chatting about her year in Washtenaw County where she's just completed an academic program for accomplished journalists at the University of Michigan. Welcome, Anastasia!
Anastasia Tsioulcas: Thanks for having me!
Caroline MacGregor: It's fascinating to us locally because you are a Knight-Wallace Fellow, and you've been doing this academic program through the University of Michigan. Tell me more about this if you would.
Anastasia Tsioulcas: Sure thing! Well, the Knight-Wallis Fellowship Program for Journalists has been around for over 50 years now. I've been part of the 51st cohort. But this was the first year that they had a place specifically for an arts journalist. There have been other arts journalists to participate in the program over the years--really wonderful folks whom I've been lucky to follow in their footsteps. But I was the inaugural Wallace House Arts Journalism fellow, which was a program between both the Wallace House Center for Journalists and also through the U of M's Arts Initiative, which is led by Mark Clague. So, I sort of lived this double life at the university all year which is really fantastic.
Caroline MacGregor: Your background is very interesting. You've covered a number of diverse topics. You've curated episodes of the Tiny Desk concert series. You've reported globally from Africa, Asia and Europe, I believe, is that correct?
Anastasia Tsioulcas: It sure is, yes! And the Caribbean as well.
Caroline MacGregor: But before we get into that part of things, tell me about your experience here in Ann Arbor while studying at the University of Michigan.
Anastasia Tsioulcas: It's a really fantastic experience. I've been part of a cohort of 18 journalists from around the world: people who do everything from wartime reporting to folks whose careers are focused on the future of journalism. So, we would get together two or three times a week with experts in our field, newsroom leaders, really wonderful thinkers. We traveled together to places like Serbia and Bosnia to talk about how journalism has shaped narratives there, especially as the former Yugoslavia fell apart into separate countries in war. I had the opportunity to take classes at the University of Michigan. And, as well, I actually taught a year-long arts journalism workshop for budding emerging arts critics across all three of the university's campuses. So, I had students participating from the U of M Ann Arbor and Dearborn and Flint. And that was a really special and gratifying experience!
Caroline MacGregor: I can imagine it sounds like you really enjoyed your time in Washtenaw County.
Anastasia Tsioulcas: I absolutely did! I was based in Ann Arbor a lot. Oh, I should say also I did a study project looking at diversity initiatives at arts organizations across southeast Michigan. So, I was hitting the road pretty frequently too. So, I got to know much of the area, and I absolutely loved it! The people have been so kind, so welcoming, so enthusiastic. And I felt really like part of the community very soon after arriving, and it's been an incredible gift of a year.
Caroline MacGregor: Tell me about some of your most interesting reporting experiences or areas that you've covered that have been of particular interest to you.
Anastasia Tsioulcas: Oh, gosh! Too many to name, which sounds glib, but really isn't. My favorite experiences as a reporter have ranged from everything from, wow, traveling to Detroit from my home base in New York city to report on the home going service for Aretha Franklin when she passed away. I have traveled deep in the Sahara desert in Northern Mali to report on twarig musicians holding a music festival in the middle of the desert oasis.
Caroline MacGregor: Oh my gosh!
Anastasia Tsioulcas: Gosh, I've written liner notes for the likes of the late Indian sitar virtuoso Ravi Shankar and the adventurous Kronos Quartet. I've had a gift of incredible experiences across my career.
Caroline MacGregor: So, what's coming up next for you?
Anastasia Tsioulcas: So, next for me, most immediately next as it happens, I'm going to be part of the team covering the Sean Combs federal criminal trial in Manhattan, which is expected to go on for about two months. So, that's literally the first thing I'm doing upon return to NPR. But I'm also really looking forward to sharing the results of my reporting that I've accumulated over the year in Southeast Michigan, sort of looking at what organizations--everything from symphonies to individual artists--are doing in terms of access and equity in their performing institutions and their grassroots organizations. Obviously, the landscape for anything that is related to equity access and diversity is a hot topic of conversation and debate right now. So, as of the year I spent in Michigan continued, those public conversations were evolving at a really rapid clip. And I'm going to be reporting on those conversations and the information I sought out during my time as a Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellow.
Caroline MacGregor: I'm speaking with Anastasia Tsioulcas. She is an NPR correspondent, and she recently completed her Knight-Wallace Fellowship at U of M. You mentioned Sean Combs, and you've extensively covered the Me Too movement in the music industry, and you mentioned some of those things, also gender issues, and then accusations of sexual misconduct against singer R. Kelly. The Me Too movement, this has been an enormous cultural shift over the past years. Tell me a little bit about your experience covering this area.
Anastasia Tsioulcas: Sure. Well, as you mentioned, I was NPR's lead reporter for the national network on the long R. Kelly trial that was successfully prosecuted against him, and he remains in prison for that. I've also covered aspects of the Harvey Weinstein trials. I have covered extensively accusations against the opera superstar Placido Domingo and the fallout that happened in his career as a result. And I've also covered sort of more general issues of gender imbalance, especially in the music industry and at the Grammy Awards in particular over the years. So, it's become something of a subspecialty of mine. And you mentioned the Sean Combs trial, and this is a federal criminal trial. There are also literally dozens of civil lawsuits against him. And I would say that those civil lawsuits were, in a lot of respects, a direct result of the Me Too movement and legislation that passed that allowed, for example in New York, a much larger window of time for accusers and alleged victims to come forward. So, as there was sort of this avalanche of civil suit, federal prosecutors stepped into the ring as well and launched criminal investigations. So, that's going to be playing out over the next couple of months. So, I think we are seeing sort of this long, long tail. We don't use the word so frequently in this very moment, as we did a few years ago. But I think we're going to continue to see sort of this long tail effect of not just the cultural shifts but also the legal ramifications of what's happened in this movement. One of the things I think about a lot is, and I think about it because I was so intensely involved in the R. Kelly trial, is, yes, his career ended both effectively and legally. But also, there were, in that case, many, many young Black and brown girls who are either derided or mocked or ignored and their voices finally came to the surface and they were taken seriously. For R. Kelly, back in the heyday of his career, there were rumors. But those girls--and I do mean girls, minors at the time--were mocked in the court of public opinion. They became the butt of jokes online and on television and so forth. And within that trial, their voices were taken seriously, and it's really hard for me not to think, and I think for others, not to think about how their lives were derailed by this individual who was indeed found guilty of those crimes. So, that's something I try to keep in mind is the victims. And one of the other ramifications, of course, especially with civil suits, is there have been, in many instances, nuisance lawsuits--slap lawsuits--filed against accusers also to sort of sideline their accusations and sort of tangle them up in separate lawsuits. So, it's really complicated, but at the same time, one of the things that really has come to light is this centering of victims' voices.
Caroline MacGregor: Quickly, President Trump issued an executive order directing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's Board of Directors to cease federal funding for NPR and PBS. We've really entered a new age here with regards to attacks on journalism in America. Tell me what your reaction is to this.
Anastasia Tsioulcas: Speaking solely for myself, solely as a journalist, one of the things I thought about a lot this year and came away with was an extremely strong, rock-solid sense of how much journalism matters in a healthy functioning democracy. And I am personally extremely proud to work for NPR and to see what our journalists and our colleagues across the public media landscape, including, of course, WEMU, continue to do.
Caroline MacGregor: Okay! Well, thank you so much for joining me today!
Anastasia Tsioulcas: Thank you for having me! It's been a real treat!
Caroline MacGregor: This is 89.1 WEMU FM Ypsilanti.
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