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Susan Stamberg      

Nationally Renowned Broadcast Journalist & NPR Special Correspondent

Nationally renowned broadcast journalist Susan Stamberg is a special correspondent for NPR.

Stamberg is the first woman to anchor a national nightly news program and has won every major award in broadcasting. She has been inducted into the Broadcasting Hall of Fame and the Radio Hall of Fame. In March 2020 her name and a star were embedded on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles. An NPR "founding mother," Stamberg has been on staff since the network began in 1971.

Beginning in 1972, Stamberg served as co-host of NPR's award-winning newsmagazine "All Things Considered" for 14 years. She then hosted "Weekend Edition Sunday," and now reports on cultural issues for "Morning Edition" and "Weekend Edition Saturday."

One of the most popular broadcasters in public radio, Stamberg is well known for her conversational style, intelligence, and knack for finding an interesting story. Her interviewing has been called "fresh," "friendly, down-to-earth," and (by novelist E.L. Doctorow) "the closest thing to an enlightened humanist on the radio." Her thousands of interviews include conversations with Laura Bush, Billy Crystal, Rosa Parks, Dave Brubeck, and Luciano Pavarotti.

Prior to joining NPR, she served as producer, program director, and general manager of NPR Member Station WAMU-FM/Washington, DC. Stamberg is the author of two books -- "Every Night at Five: Susan Stamberg's All Things Considered Book" and "Talk: NPR's Susan Stamberg Considers All Things" -- and co-editor of a third, "The Wedding Cake in the Middle of the Road," a collection that grew out of a series of stories she commissioned for "Weekend Edition Sunday."

In addition to her Hall of Fame inductions, other recognitions include the Armstrong and duPont Awards, the Edward R. Murrow Award from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, The Ohio State University's Golden Anniversary Director's Award, and the Distinguished Broadcaster Award from the American Women in Radio and Television.

A native of New York City, Stamberg earned a bachelor's degree from Barnard College, and has been awarded numerous honorary degrees including a Doctor of Humane Letters from Dartmouth College. She is a Fellow of Silliman College, Yale University, and has served on the boards of the PEN/Faulkner Fiction Award Foundation and the National Arts Journalism Program based at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism. She is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Stamberg has hosted a number of series on PBS, moderated three Fred Rogers television specials for adults, served as commentator, guest or co-host on various commercial TV programs, and appeared as a narrator in performance with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and the National Symphony Orchestra. Her voice appeared on Broadway in the Wendy Wasserstein play "An American Daughter."

Speech Topics

Arts Make Community

Inspiring Women

This keynote presentation is a portrait of women of our time who have inspired, broken ground, led, had the courage to survive -- all profiled by Stamberg in her reporting career. Georgia O'Keeffe -- the most famous woman artist of the century and how she changed the way we look at objects and found the poetry in things. Miep Gies -- who found, then saved the diary of Anne Frank, and helped the Frank family throughout World War Two. Betsy Wilson -- not famous, but the courageous founder of Let's Face It, a self-help organization for those with facial disfigurements. Nancy Reagan -- how a former First Lady kept me out in the cold.

Jewish Mothers

In this keynote speech, Stamberg discusses how the image of the Jewish mother has changed over the years, from stereotypical immigrant Yiddishe Mama, to J.d. Salinger's Mrs. Glass, to Philip Roth's Mrs. Portnoy, to linguist Deborah Tannen's contemporary Mother. The speech incorporates examples from literature – ranging from hilarious, to sad, to moving, and back again.

Four Who Changed Our Times

Writer Ernest Hemingway, director Elia Kazan, painter Georgia O'Keeffe, singer Frank Sinatra. This keynote speech delves into the impact Hemingway made on literature, when he invented a new, spare way to write fiction (both Barak Obama and John McCain named Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls as a favorite book) and the impact Kazan made as a '50s film and theatre director who introduced America to a new, raw way of acting and presenting drama. Then there is O'Keeffe, our most important female artist who showed us new way to look at the world around us. Finally, there is Sinatra who was the first great modern pop music singer and set a standard no one has ever been able to match. The speech is based on reporting and interviews done by Susan Stamberg.

JEWS OF SHANGHAI

JEWISH MOTHERS

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WOMEN IN JOURNALISM

INSPIRING WOMEN

MAKING COMMUNITY

WHY MUSEUMS MATTER/WHY THE ARTS ARE IMPORTANT

FORGIVE US OUR PRESS PASSES

LEADERSHIP TODAY

SURVIVING BREAST CANCER

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