At only 8 years old, Deborah Douglas knew that she wanted to be a journalist. She remembered moments when adults towered over her younger self, constantly arguing and never taking time to understand each other’s perspectives. Douglas vowed to find a way to be a connecting force between people and help them listen to one another. “I feel like a transformation can happen when we really connect with people and hear what they have to say,” said Douglas.
Today, Professor Douglas feeds her passion for story-telling and bearing witness to the lived human experience through her work as a journalist and as the Eugene S. Pulliam Visiting Professor of Journalism here at DePauw. “Really my presence here is just a fulfillment of a promise to myself as a child to grow up and tell other people’s stories. To grow up and really listen to people and really see people.”