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Home Archives for James Fallows Page 5

Posts by author

James Fallows

357 posts
James Fallows is a longtime correspondent for The Atlantic magazine. He has reported for the magazine from around the world since the late 1970s, including extended assignments in China, Japan, and Southeast Asia, and within the United States in Texas, Washington state, and California. He has written 12 books and won the American Book Award, the National Magazine Award, and a documentary Emmy. He has also done extensive commentary on National Public Radio.
Archway Entrance for the University of Dayton, in Ohio. "The city is in our name," says the university's president. "It's our future." (Courtesy of the University of Dayton)
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  • Colleges & Universities

The University of Dayton Is Reinventing Town-Gown Relations

  • James Fallows
  • December 11, 2019
It’s time for another report on Dayton, Ohio, subject of this introduction last month. A century ago, Dayton was known mainly for the things it created, from the Wright Brothers’ airplanes…
Person drilling into wood.
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  • Economic Development

New Jobs, New Residents, and New Possibilities

  • James Fallows
  • December 6, 2019
Here are news items and developments related to trends we’ve been covering in the recent “Our Towns” series, and elsewhere: The furniture business returns, and is looking for furniture-makers. In a…
Sixty-one members of this year's Report for America corps at their training session in Houston this past summer. RFA has just announced that it will send four times as many reporters to local newsrooms next year.
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  • Local Institutions

Report for America Goes Big

  • James Fallows
  • December 3, 2019
It has been another rough period for the financial models behind journalism in general, and local news outlets in particular. Last month Brookings released a sobering report about the spread of “news…
Image of abandoned mall.
View Post
  • Economic Development

The Death and Afterlife of the Mall

  • James Fallows
  • November 21, 2019
The shopping mall has had a dramatic fall from grace. Once the veritable town square and a cornerstone of American consumerism, malls have aged into oblivion, replaced by cheaper and…
Deb Fallows on part of the farm near Guymon, Oklahoma, where Caroline Henderson wrote her “Letters from the Dust Bowl” series for The Atlantic in the 1930s. At the time, the area was a thriving farm community. Now it is deserted.
View Post
  • Governance

Democrats Should Talk About Place-Based Policy

  • James Fallows
  • November 20, 2019
Staying versus moving is one of the eternal tensions of American life. Americans have frequently moved: Consider how the geographic center of the population has shifted over the centuries, from…
Mark Russell, executive editor of The Commercial Appeal in Memphis.
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  • Local Journalism

In Defense of The Commercial Appeal

  • James Fallows
  • November 13, 2019
A few days ago I published an item about a new online journalistic site in Tennessee, The Daily Memphian. In that item, I quoted some Daily Memphian officials saying that they had been prompted…
Overpass in Memphis Tennessee.
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  • Local Journalism

On the Virtues of Statewide Journalism

  • James Fallows
  • November 12, 2019
A few days ago I published an item about a year-old online effort to revive local news coverage in Tennessee, The Daily Memphian. It was part of an ongoing series about efforts to…
Mehmet McMillan, founder of WildPlaces, and Shelley Forbes, of Otis College, at the seedling-shipping ceremony last week.
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  • Trees

Planting a ‘Trail of Giants’

  • James Fallows
  • November 11, 2019
Last month, as part of a “Big Little Ideas” series, I mentioned a surprisingly valuable short-term step that communities can take, on their own, for positive climate effects. That is to start planting…
Justin Rushing, advertising director of the online news site The Daily Memphian.
View Post
  • Local Institutions

In Memphis, A Lab Experiment for Local News

  • James Fallows
  • November 8, 2019
It’s time for another look at new financial, editorial, and technological models for local journalism. You’ll find previous entries at these links: from Mississippi; from Maine; from Massachusetts; from Southern California and the San Francisco…
Overlooking downtown Dayton.
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  • Economic Development

The Gem City Moves Forward

  • James Fallows
  • November 5, 2019
This is the first in a series of posts on the city of Dayton, Ohio. I’ve been there three times since August and am about to make another trip. Almost…
The Shawangunk Journal offices in Ellenville, New York. Backwards sign made by artist Roger Baker.
View Post
  • Local Journalism

The New Approach to Local Journalism

  • James Fallows
  • October 27, 2019
Here’s another installment in the ongoing series on how local news operations, especially newspapers, can devise new ways to stay in business. For previous entries—from Mississippi, from Maine, from Massachusetts, from Southern California and the San…
"Traditionally, white gowns were for girls, blue for boys," Worth Robbins said of Harvard's high-school-graduation ceremony, pictured here in 2016. "For the past six years, seniors have voted to have the gowns distributed randomly. This year the seniors voted to have only blue gowns, a symbol of their propensity for knocking down differences and announcing themselves as a class of innovators and activists."
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  • Local Journalism

‘We’re Doing It for Love of Community’

  • James Fallows
  • October 16, 2019
Do local public-radio stations play an important role? In big cities, from Boston and Washington to San Francisco and L.A.? In small towns, like those across Mississippi or Alaska or…
People planting a tree.
View Post
  • Trees

Start Planting Trees

  • James Fallows
  • October 13, 2019
Recently Deb Fallows kicked off a series of “Big Little Ideas”—innovations or reforms that could be applied fairly easily at the local level and that might have cumulatively very important effect.…
Two women involved with Project Lia look up at windows they helped restore.
View Post
  • Economic Development

Rebuilding After Incarceration

  • James Fallows
  • October 7, 2019
More than 2 million Americans are in the country’s prisons and jails now, giving the United States both the largest number of prisoners and the highest per-capita incarceration rate in…
Children at an event put on by the Big Car Collaborative in Indianapolis (Courtesy of Jensen Productions and New America)
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  • Arts

How Art Can Renew a Community

  • James Fallows
  • October 2, 2019
This is No. 2 in a series of three videos from our friends at New America about the realities of community revitalization and economic recovery in the much-discussed Industrial Heartland of…
animated image of flowers and column breaking
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  • Civic Life

The End of the Roman Empire Wasn’t That Bad

  • James Fallows
  • October 1, 2019
Maybe the end of the American one won’t be either

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