Zina Kumok | March 24, 2011
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| Photo by Zina Kumok |
| Alumna Sheila Lalwani talked to students about how journalists' work can effect change. “Find issues that you really care about and go forward as if you couldn’t fail,” she said. |
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Lalwani, BAJ’02, is a research fellow at the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University, where her work focuses on Muslims in North America, Europe and Asia. She was on campus to speak to this week’s Re-scripting Islam conference sponsored by the Voices and Visions: Islam and Muslims from a Global Perspective.
During her talk, Lalwani drew on her work as an international reporter and researcher. As the winner of the Hazeltine Scholarship upon graduating from IU, Lalwani set off for a four-month trip researching childhood illiteracy in India. That country has the highest rate of childhood illiteracy in the world.
The number of children working instead of going to school shocked Lalwani, who explained that while illegal, the caste system still is in place, so not everyone is treated equally.
“There is a sense of belief that not everybody in India deserves an education,” she said.
This awareness of injustice shaped Lalwani’s future reporting that took her to Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Austria and Germany.
Lalwani recounted an early editor telling her she had a problem.
“You care too much,” she said he told her.
But Lalwani disagreed. She urged her audience to never miss an opportunity to tell someone that you care.
“It will make or break you,” she said.
She talked about seeing reporters being rude, insensitive and uncaring to people who had undergone serious trauma and personal tragedy. Lalwani said she always wanted to be as understanding as possible, to be the reporter that subjects could trust.
“I started to see journalism as a way to change the world,” she said of reporting about on Thai orphans whose parents were HIV-positive and Muslim Bosnian women raped during the wars in the former Yugoslavia.
Based on her articles about illiteracy in India, people donated enough money to send 30 children to school.
“Use your life to improve other people’s lives,” she said.
But even while she advised journalists to not lose their humanity, Lalwani also cautioned them not to cross certain boundaries.
“Keep your moral outrage in check,” she said.
Lalwani applied her philosophy as she extended her education to receive a master’s degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, where she led the Religion and Public Life Professional Interest Council and was also awarded fellowships from the Women and Public Policy Program and Harvard Law School. Today, she continues this work at Georgetown.
Speaking to a group of graduating seniors, Lalwani said they did not need to have an exact plan for post-graduation. But, she said they should have a “rough sketch.”
“If you want your life to matter, pursue the things you care about,” she said. “Find issues that you really care about and go forward as if you couldn’t fail.”
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