Through The James D. Ewing Lecture on Ethics in Journalism, the DeWitt Wallace Center invites widely respected media leaders to Duke University to discuss issues associated with ethics and values in media.

The Ewing lectures are endowed by James D. Ewing, who was publisher emeritus of The Keene Sentinel in New Hampshire and vice chairman and co-founder of the Center for Foreign Journalists in Washington, D.C.  Mr. Ewing endowed this annual lecture to provide a forum for defining and exploring those principles that should guide journalists and news executives, and those who interact with them, in their daily work.

In considering whom to invite for the Ewing Lecture on Ethics in Journalism each year, the DeWitt Wallace Center looks to individuals who are widely respected not only for the high-caliber of their work in communications, but for the lasting values that it imparts for future generations.

2021 Ewing Lectures

November 11, 2021, 5:30 pm, in Sanford 04, or on ZoomThe Story of the U.S. Digital Divide

The U.S. digital divide long existed before the onset of the global pandemic. Prior to the public health crisis, millions of people, which some have argued was nearly 100 million people, were not connected to the internet. With the social distancing requirements of COVID-19 and the transition from analog to digital activities, many more people, including students, farmers, senior citizens, and low-income workers, found themselves among the digitally invisible, attempting to navigate through the burgeoning and now critical digital economy. America failed them by not leaning into the urgency of universal broadband access and failing to recognize the competitiveness of the digital landscape in the global economy. Join Dr. Turner Lee, a senior fellow in Governance Studies and director of the Center for Technology Innovation at the Brookings Institution as she shares the details of her forthcoming book, "Digitally Invisible: How the Internet is Creating the New Underclass" (Brookings Press, 2022). Dr. Turner Lee will unpack what has been historically defined as the “digital divide” in urban, rural, and suburban areas, and offer proposals that policymakers, industry, and civil society organizations can undertake to ensure digital equity and inclusion.

More info on this event, and how to register online.

March 17, 2021When reporting goes wrong: Battling media bias about historically Black spaces

When North Carolina A&T student journalists got fed up with local news outlets linking their campus to unrelated crime scenes, they documented the slights. Editor-in-chief Alexis Wray worked hard to show editors what they did. Some changed but this work is far from done. Despite decades of such efforts, Black journalists are still pushing newsrooms to see and evict racial bias from the news. Moderated by DeWitt Wallace faculty member, Cathy Clabby.

2019

Chuck Todd

NBC News Political Director and host of Meet the Press

Defending Journalism: A conversation with Chuck Todd

 

2018

Emily Steel

Reporter for The New York Times

The Reckoning: How New York Times reporters exposed sexual harassment at Fox News and Vice and sparked a national conversation

 

2017

Ted Koppel

Special contributor, CBS News Sunday Morning News

Trust and the Future of Journalism

 

2017

Hallie Jackson

NC News Chief White House Correspondent

Covering the Trump White House

 

2017

Gabriel Sherman

National Affairs Editor, New York Magazine

Fox News and the Rise of Alternative Facts

 

2016

Margaret Sullivan

The New York Times public editor

Ethics at The New York Times: Anonymous sources, quote approval and the rush for scoops

 

2015

Ann Compton

Former ABC News White House Correspondent

Reporting the American Presidency

 

2014

Martha Raddatz

ABC News chief global affairs correspondent

Power, Politics and War: Reporting from the Front Lines

 

2014

Sandra Rodríguez Nieto

2014 Harvard Nieman Fellow; former Investigative Reporter, El Diario de Juárez; recipient of the 2013 Daniel Pearl Award for Outstanding International Investigative Reporting.

The James D. Ewing Lecture on Ethics in Journalism

 

2012

Steve Coll

President, New America Foundation

Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power

 

2012

Lea Thompson

LT Productions, former NBC News/DATELINE chief correspondent and anchor

The James D. Ewing Lecture on Ethics in Journalism

 

2010

Jane Mayer

Staff writer, The New Yorker Magazine

Journalism and the War on Terror: Reporting from the “Dark Side

 

2009

Dana Priest

Investigative Reporter, The Washington Post

Adventures in Journalism: from CIA Secret Prisons to Walter Reed

 

2009

John Carroll

Former editor of the Los Angeles Times

Ten Toxic Notions: Journalism’s Perilous Voyage into the Digital Future

 

2008

Stephen W. Smith

Former Africa editor and deputy foreign editor of Le Monde

‘Terrible is the Temptation of the Good’: Ethical Paradoxes in Africa

 

2006

Andrea Mitchell

Chief foreign affairs correspondent, NBC

A Conversation on Media Ethics

 

2006

David Gergen

Editor-at-large for U.S. News and World Report, director of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government

The Press versus Government in a Time of War

 

2005

Jason DeParle

Senior writer, The New York Times

Reporting on the Welfare System

 

2004

Rick Kaplan

MSNBC, former president of CNN News

Television and the War on Terrorism

 

2002

Jamie Shea

Director of information and press, NATO

The James D. Ewing Lecture on Ethics in Journalism

 

2000

Seymour Hersh

Author and journalist

Ethics and the Big Story

 

1999

Judy Woodruff

Senior correspondent and anchor for CNN Thursday night.

Covering Ethics and Character in the Presidential Campaign

 

1999

David Halberstam

Journalist and author

Playing for Keeps: Michael Jordan and the World He Made: The Best and the Brightest, the Powers That Be

 

1998

Marvin Kalb

Director of Harvard University’s Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy

Journalism Ethics in the Competitive 24-Hour Market

 

1997

Bob Woodward

Investigative reporter, The Washington Post

The James D. Ewing Lecture on Ethics in Journalism

 

1996

William Raspberry

Columnist, The Washington Post

Race and Equity in America

 

1995

Rushworth M. Kidder

Former columnist, Christian Science Monitor, president of Institute for Global Ethics

James D. Ewing Lecture on Ethics in Communications

 

1994

Tom Brokaw

Anchor and managing editor of NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw

Journalists at War

 

1992

Eugene Patterson

Former CEO, St. Petersburg Times, Professor of Journalism at Duke University

The First Amendment Does Indenture the Press with Companion Obligations

Previous Lectures

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