Guy Raz

Guy Raz is the host of TED Radio Hour, a co-production of NPR and TED that tackles astonishing inventions, fresh approaches to old problems and new ways to think and create. Each radio show is based on talks given by riveting speakers on the renowned TED stage, bound together by a common theme such as the thrill of space exploration, going to extremes, the source of happiness or 'when rights goes wrong' in our justice system. Currently, he is also a Ferris professor of journalism at Princeton University where he teaches radio reporting.

Previously, Raz was weekend host of NPR News' signature afternoon newsmagazine All Things Considered. Raz was named host of that program in July 2009. During his tenure, Raz transformed the sound and format of the program, introducing the now-signature "cover story" and creating the popular "Three-Minute Fiction" writing contest.

Raz joined NPR in 1997 as an intern for All Things Considered and he worked his way through the ranks of the organization. His first job was the assistant to NPR's legendary news analyst Daniel Schorr. Raz then served as a general assignment reporter covering stories ranging from the early 2000 presidential primaries to a profile on the Doors' song "Light My Fire."

In 2000, at the age of 25, Raz was made NPR's Berlin bureau chief where he covered eastern Europe and the Balkans. Later, he was transferred to London as the bureau chief and covered the war in Iraq. Raz left NPR in 2004, to work as CNN's Jerusalem correspondent chronicling everything from the rise of Hamas as a political power to the incapacitation of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Israel's 2005 withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. Two years later Raz returned to NPR to serve as defense correspondent where he covered the Pentagon and the US military.

During his six years abroad, Raz reported from more than 40 countries, with a focus on Iraq, Israel and the Palestinian Territories, Afghanistan, Eastern Europe and the Balkans. He profiled and interviewed dozens of world leaders, including former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Shimon Peres, General David Petraeus and Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen.

For his reporting from Iraq, Raz was awarded both the Edward R. Murrow Award and the Daniel Schorr Journalism prize. His reporting has contributed to two duPont Awards and one Peabody awarded to NPR. He's been a finalist for the Livingston Award four times. For his reporting from Germany, Raz was awarded both the RIAS Berlin prize and the Arthur F. Burns Award. In 2008, he spent a year as a Nieman journalism fellow at Harvard University where he studied classical history.

Raz's written work has appeared in Salon, Washington City Paper, The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor and the German daily, Sueddeutsche Zeitung.

Miners Weather The Slow Burn Of Coal's Demise

By & Lauren Silverman • Jul 14, 2012

At some point today, you will probably flip on a light switch. That simple action connects you to the oldest and most plentiful source of American electricity: coal.

Since the early 1880s — when Edison and Tesla pioneered the distribution of electrical power into our homes — most of that power has come from the process of burning coal.

Blacks, Gays And The Church

By • May 27, 2012

Transcript

GUY RAZ, HOST:

Let's turn to another story we've been following in recent weeks: African-Americans and same-sex marriage. When President Obama came out in support of gay marriage, some African-American religious leaders protested. But according to new polling data, African-Americans are no less supportive or, for that matter, opposed to gay marriage than any other group in the country.

Disqualifications Hit Egyptian Elections

By • Apr 15, 2012

Transcript

GUY RAZ, HOST:

Staying overseas, and to Egypt now, where election officials have stunned voters by banning three of the top contenders running in the country's upcoming presidential elections. Those candidates include Omar Suleiman, the vice president under Hosni Mubarak, the other two, a powerful leader from the Muslim Brotherhood and an ultra-conservative Islamist cleric.

Afghanistan Hit By Deadly Attacks

By • Apr 15, 2012

Transcript

GUY RAZ, HOST:

And if you're just joining us, you're listening to WEEKENDS on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I'm Guy Raz.

In Afghanistan today, the Taliban has launched a string of attacks across the country, including coordinated strikes in the capital, Kabul, that hit near western targets and Afghan government buildings. The Taliban says today's attack marks the beginning of what they call the spring fighting season, the period after the winter thaw when mountain passes and roads become accessible again.

Lost Malcolm X Speech Heard Again 50 Years Later

By • Feb 4, 2012

Last semester, Brown senior Malcolm Burnley took a narrative writing course. One of the assignments was to write a fictional story based on something true — and that true event had to be found inside the university archives.

"So I went to the archives and started flipping through dusty compilations of student newspapers, and there was this old black-and-white photo of when Malcolm X came to speak," Burnley says. "There was one short article that corresponded to it, and very little else."

How Crossword Puzzles Unlocked An Artist's Memory

By • Oct 12, 2011

It's not often you see an image of a brain scan on the wall of an art exhibit. But among works by Monet and Sisley at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore hangs just that — a cross-section of a human brain. It belongs to artist Lonni Sue Johnson.

The room is really two exhibits — the art Johnson created before she contracted viral encephalitis in 2007, which destroyed her hippocampus and parts of her left temporal lobe — and her work after.