Commencement Address Doctor of Humane Letters, Honoris Causa Nicholas D. Kristof NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF, a columnist for The New York Times since November 2001, is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winning journalist. Mr. Kristof is the son of Portland State University professors Jane Kristof and the late Ladis Kristof. He grew up on his parent’s sheep and cherry farm near Yamhill, Oregon. He graduated from Harvard College, Phi Beta Kappa, and then won a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford, where he studied law and graduated with first class honors. He later studied Arabic in Cairo and Chinese in Taipei. After working in France, he caught the travel bug and began backpacking around Africa and Asia, writing articles to cover his expenses. Mr. Kristof has lived on four continents, reported on six, and traveled to more than 150 countries, every Chinese province and every main Japanese island (and all 50 states). During his travels, he has had unpleasant experiences with malaria, mobs and an African airplane crash. After joining the Times in 1984, he served as a correspondent in Los Angeles and as bureau chief in Hong Kong, Beijing, and Tokyo. He later was associate managing editor of the Times, responsible for Sunday editions. In 1990 Mr. Kristof and his wife, Sheryl WuDunn, won a Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of Chinas Tiananmen Square movement. They were the first married couple to win a Pulitzer for journalism. Mr. Kristof won a second Pulitzer in 2006, for what judges called “his graphic, deeply reported columns that, at personal risk, focused attention on genocide in Darfur.” Mr. Kristof has also won numerous other journalism prizes, and his January 1997 article about child deaths in the developing world, helped lead Bill and Melinda Gates to focus their charitable work on global health. The article is framed in the gallery of the Gates Foundation. Mr. Kristof has taken a special interest in web journalism and was the first blogger on The New York Times website. He has a channel on Youtube and more than 1.5 million followers on Twitter and Facebook. Mr. Kristof and Ms. WuDunn are authors of three best-selling books: China Wakes: The Struggle for the Soul of a Rising Power m 1994; Thunder from the East: Portrait of a Rising Asia in 2000; and Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide in 2009. Mr. Kristof is also the subject of an HBO documentary. Reporter, produced by Ben Affleck, and serves on the boards of Harvard University and the American Association of Rhodes Scholars. He has received a number of honorary doctorates and other honors. Mr. Kristof and Ms. WuDunn are the parents of three children. Mr. Kristof enjoys running, backpacking, and having his Chinese and Japanese corrected by his children. 9
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