Christine Mungai, a 2018 Nieman Fellow, is the curator and editor of The Elephant, a Nairobi, Kenya-based publication examining the African condition through essays, features, and longreads. Previously, she was a writer and editor at africapedia.com.
Five years ago, I was nearly killed by a man I shared a home and two small children with. As I lay in the dark, waiting for it to be safe to leave, I … Read more
On January 15, 2019, five armed men attacked a luxury hotel and office complex in Nairobi, Kenya, blasting their way through with grenades and firing indiscriminately. By the time the siege was over about 20 hours later, … Read more
I came into journalism in a roundabout way. I was a voracious reader as a child, growing up in middle-class Nairobi, partly as a retreat from a difficult home situation as my parents’ marriage broke down. I spent hours poring over world maps, absorbing obscure facts from encyclopedias, and reading all manner of novels from Dickens classics to Sweet Valley High. Read more
Journalism is in crisis; that is old news. But since I arrived at Harvard nearly three months ago, I have been struck at how much emotional and intellectual energy is being expended in the U.S. declaring that journalism is on … Read more
