Photo by Leanora Benkato
Amanda J. Crawford is a creative writer, journalist, professor, musician, world traveler, community advocate and urban farmer.
Born in a small town in Western Maryland, Amanda was the first person in her family to go to college. After graduating with honors from the University of Maryland, she worked as a reporter for People Magazine, The Baltimore Sun, The Arizona Republic, Bloomberg News and Businessweek. While she specialized in deep dives that showed the human impact of public policy, she has covered everything from mass murders to presidential campaigns, celebrities to immigration reform and has written for a range of other publications, including Ms. Magazine, National Geographic and Phoenix Magazine. She was a finalist for the Livingston Award for the best U.S. journalist under 35 in 2006 for a six-day series on health care, and she was awarded a Soros Justice Media Fellowship with the Open Society Foundation in 2010 to spend a year writing about the connection between drug policy and border violence.
Amanda earned her master of mass communication degree from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University, where she also served on faculty. She is now an assistant professor at Western Kentucky University's School of Journalism and Broadcasting, where she teaches reporting and feature writing and oversees in-depth student projects in journalism capstone classes.
In her own writing, Amanda has recently returned her focus to creative nonfiction. She is also a songwriter, singer and multi-instrumentalist who collaborates with her husband, Toby, in the indie band Former Friends of Young Americans. Together they run FFOYA House, a community arts space in Bowling Green, Kentucky, dedicated to connecting musicians and other artists with social justice causes and sustainable living practices.
Amanda J. Crawford is a creative writer, journalist, professor, musician, world traveler, community advocate and urban farmer.
Born in a small town in Western Maryland, Amanda was the first person in her family to go to college. After graduating with honors from the University of Maryland, she worked as a reporter for People Magazine, The Baltimore Sun, The Arizona Republic, Bloomberg News and Businessweek. While she specialized in deep dives that showed the human impact of public policy, she has covered everything from mass murders to presidential campaigns, celebrities to immigration reform and has written for a range of other publications, including Ms. Magazine, National Geographic and Phoenix Magazine. She was a finalist for the Livingston Award for the best U.S. journalist under 35 in 2006 for a six-day series on health care, and she was awarded a Soros Justice Media Fellowship with the Open Society Foundation in 2010 to spend a year writing about the connection between drug policy and border violence.
Amanda earned her master of mass communication degree from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University, where she also served on faculty. She is now an assistant professor at Western Kentucky University's School of Journalism and Broadcasting, where she teaches reporting and feature writing and oversees in-depth student projects in journalism capstone classes.
In her own writing, Amanda has recently returned her focus to creative nonfiction. She is also a songwriter, singer and multi-instrumentalist who collaborates with her husband, Toby, in the indie band Former Friends of Young Americans. Together they run FFOYA House, a community arts space in Bowling Green, Kentucky, dedicated to connecting musicians and other artists with social justice causes and sustainable living practices.
