Award-winning NPR podcasters to visit UW as fall Journalists in Residence

Rund Abdelfatah and Ramtin Arablouei, co-hosts and producers of NPR’s Peabody Award-winning podcast “Throughline,” will serve as UW–Madison’s fall Journalists in Residence Nov. 14-16.

“Throughline,” launched in February 2019 and developed by Abdelfatah and Arablouei, explores history through immersive, audio-rich storytelling designed to reintroduce history to new audiences.

As Journalists in Residence, they will meet with university students, faculty and staff to share their experiences and expertise. On Monday, Abdelfatah and Arablouei will participate in a public panel discussion as part of the Diversity Forum. Held at the Chazen Museum of Art, which currently hosts the public exhibit: Sifting & Reckoning: UW–Madison’s History of Exclusion and Resistance, the talk will be moderated by Christy Clark-Pujara, a professor of history in the Department of Afro-American Studies. Public History Project Director Kacie Lucchini Butcher will join as a panelist. In-person registration is closed, but viewers can register to livestream the event or view it on Facebook.

Abdelfatah and Arablouei’s time at UW–Madison will also include classroom visits with history, communication arts and journalism students, conversations with university podcasters and local radio producers, and meetings with campus experts.

Abdelfatah joined NPR in 2014 as an intern, before working as a producer on several of NPR’s most popular podcasts, including “How I Built This,” “TED Radio Hour,” “NPR Politics Podcast,” “Code Switch,” and “Pop Culture Happy Hour.” She got her start in journalism covering local and domestic politics at the BBC Washington.

A trained audio engineer, Arablouei joined NPR in 2015. In addition to hosting and producing Throughline, he also produces, reports, mixes, and writes music for top-rated podcasts “TED Radio Hour,” “Hidden Brain,” “Embedded,” “Invisibilia,” “The Indicator,” “Code Switch,” “Radio Ambulante,” and the Center for Investigative Reporting’s “Reveal.”

UW–Madison’s Journalist in Residence programs started more than thirty years ago, offering the world’s top journalists an opportunity to share their expertise, engage with the campus community, and collaborate with university scholars. This year, the program welcomed FiveThirtyEight founder Nate Silver and Radiolab’s Latif Nasser. Retired NBC Supreme Court correspondent Pete Williams will be hosted by the Center for Journalism Ethics as part of the Journalist in Residence program in early December.

The Journalist in Residence programs are sponsored by University Communications and campus partners, with support from the Wisconsin Foundation and Alumni Association.