Neda Ulaby
Neda Ulaby reports on arts, entertainment, and cultural trends for NPR's Arts Desk.
Scouring the various and often overlapping worlds of art, music, television, film, new media and literature, Ulaby's stories reflect political and economic realities, cultural issues, obsessions and transitions.
A twenty-year veteran of NPR, Ulaby started as a temporary production assistant on the cultural desk, opening mail, booking interviews and cutting tape with razor blades. Over the years, she's also worked as a producer and editor and won a Gracie award from the Alliance for Women in Media Foundation for hosting a podcast of NPR's best arts stories.
Ulaby also hosted the Emmy-award winning public television series Arab American Stories in 2012 and earned a 2019 Knight-Wallace Fellowship at the University of Michigan. She's also been chosen for fellowships at the Getty Arts Journalism Program at USC Annenberg and the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism.
Before coming to NPR, Ulaby worked as managing editor of Chicago's Windy City Times and co-hosted a local radio program, What's Coming Out at the Movies. A former doctoral student in English literature, Ulaby has contributed to academic journals and taught classes in the humanities at the University of Chicago, Northeastern Illinois University and at high schools serving at-risk students.
Ulaby worked as an intern for the features desk of the Topeka Capital-Journal after graduating from Bryn Mawr College. But her first appearance in print was when she was only four days old. She was pictured on the front page of the New York Times, as a refugee, when she and her parents were evacuated from Amman, Jordan, during the conflict known as Black September.
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Eighty years ago, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed an executive order that sent thousands of Japanese Americans to internment camps. Actor George Takei was among them. -
Octavia Butler's 1979 novel Kindred is being made into a TV series. So we asked authors and critics what other not-yet-filmed books by Black authors they'd most like to see adapted for screen. -
A lot has been said about the joy of cooking, but what about the fury? A host of new cookbooks right now aim to help cooks pound, grate and shred their feelings about the state of the world.
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The American Library Association handed out nearly two dozen awards for kids' books this week. We look at some of the winners. -
America's librarians announce their top children's book picks virtually on Monday. Among the honors they're awarding are the 2021 Newbery and Caldecott medals.
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André Leon Talley was a towering figure in fashion who spoke up about Black representation and the fashion industry's toll on Black people. He passed away on Jan. 18, 2022. -
Sea shanties, the word "cheugy," feta pasta and "RushTok" were all fleeting internet obsessions over the past year. But what do such "garbage trends" say about our cultural condition? -
Teachout has died at the age of 65. He wrote acclaimed biographies of such arts figures as Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and George Balanchine. -
Richie, responsible for a seemingly endless catalog of hits, will be awarded the songwriting prize this spring by the Library of Congress. -
An evocative museum exhibition from a legendary electronic musician and naturalist encourages audiences to connect with nature through a "great animal orchestra."
