Steven Thrasher facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Steven Thrasher
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Thrasher at the 2022 Texas Book Festival
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| Alma mater | New York University |
| Occupation | Journalist, academic |
| Employer | Northwestern University |
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Notable work
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The Viral Underclass |
| Title | Daniel H. Renberg Chair of social justice in reporting |
Steven William Thrasher (born around 1978) is an American journalist and university professor. In 2019, he became the first person to hold the Daniel H. Renberg Chair of social justice in reporting. He is also an assistant professor of journalism at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. In 2012, he won the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association Journalist of the Year award. His book The Viral Underclass was published in 2022.
Contents
Early Life and Education
Steven Thrasher was born around 1978 in Ventura, California. He grew up in Oxnard, California. His parents, Margaret and William "Bill" Thrasher, came from Nebraska. They married in Iowa in 1958 because a law in Nebraska at that time prevented their marriage.
Thrasher went to Oxnard High School, where his father was a teacher. He finished high school in 1995. Later, he earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from New York University Tisch School of the Arts.
Exploring a Career in Journalism
After college, Thrasher worked as a script assistant for Saturday Night Live from 1999 to 2001. He also worked on the teams for several films, including HBO Films' The Laramie Project.
Starting in 2007, he collected personal stories for the StoryCorps Project. Then, in 2009, he became a staff writer at The Village Voice. After leaving the Voice in 2012, he continued to write for different news outlets. He also worked on his doctorate degree in American studies at New York University, which he completed in 2019. Thrasher's articles have appeared in well-known publications like The Guardian, Scientific American, The New York Times, and BuzzFeed.
Investigating Social Justice Issues
In 2014, Thrasher began looking into the story of Michael "Tiger Mandigo" Johnson. Johnson was a young Black man near St. Louis. Thrasher wrote a series of articles arguing that Johnson's legal case was unfair and related to racial bias. Thrasher's reporting showed how certain laws could make things harder for people with specific health conditions. His work helped bring attention to these issues. Johnson was released early from his sentence.
Thrasher also went to St. Louis in 2014 to report on the protests after Michael Brown's death in Ferguson.
Awards and Recognition
Steven Thrasher has received several important awards for his work.
- In 2012, he won the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association Journalist of the Year award.
- In 2015, he received the Al Neuharth Award for Innovation in Investigative Journalism.
- In 2017, he was honored by the American Sociological Association's journal Contexts.
- In 2019, he received a $75,000 grant from the Ford Foundation for his creativity and work promoting free expression.
In 2019, Thrasher became the first Daniel H. Renberg Chair of social justice in reporting. He also became an assistant professor of journalism at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.
The Viral Underclass Book
In August 2022, Thrasher published his book, The Viral Underclass: The Human Toll When Inequality and Disease Collide. It was released by Celadon Books, part of Macmillan.
In the book, Thrasher shares different stories to show how social inequality can make the effects of viruses, like HIV and COVID-19, worse for certain groups of people. These groups include people of color, disabled people, and LGBT people. The book received good reviews. Publishers Weekly gave it a top review. Jennifer Latson in The Boston Globe called it an "engaging, enraging read." In Nature, Jennifer Hochschild praised Thrasher's investigative skills.
