Stephen Bloom

This article is about the writer. For the Pennsylvania politician, see Stephen Bloom (Pennsylvania Politician).

Stephen G. Bloom is an American journalist and professor of Journalism at the University of Iowa, in Iowa City.

Background

Born in New Jersey, Bloom attended the University of California, Berkeley, and received a B.A. in 1973.

Professional career

Bloom has written for the Los Angeles Times, the San Jose Mercury News, the Sacramento Bee and the Dallas Morning News. He also served as the national news editor at the Latin America Daily Post. He was press secretary and speechwriter for San Francisco Mayor Frank Jordan during 1992. In 1993, he joined the journalism faculty of the University of Iowa, where he serves as professor and Bessie Dutton Murray Professional Scholar. Bloom has been a visiting scholar at Columbia University's Center for the Study of Society and Medicine and, during the 2011-2012 academic year, he is serving as the Howard R. Marsh Visiting Professor of Journalism in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Michigan.

Writings

Bloom has also written a number of short stories, and co-written a play called Shoedog. He wrote the book Postville: A Clash of Cultures in Heartland America, a look at a Chabad hasidic community that moved into a small Midwestern town. His book was heavily criticized in Jewish religious circles as having an anti religious bias. He has published The Oxford Project with photographer Peter Feldstein; The book consists of a series portraits of residents of Oxford, Iowa, taken 21 years apart with first-person text from the subjects.^{[citation needed]}

Tears of the Mermaid, his book about the history of pearls and the people who collect, trade, sell and obsess over them, was published by St. Martin's Press in 2009.

Observations From 20 Years of Iowa Life

In December 2011, Bloom wrote an essay entitled "Observations From 20 Years of Iowa Life" for The Atlantic, characterizing Iowans in terms of his assessment of economic and social challenges facing the state, and questioning whether Iowa's status as the first-in-the-nation caucus is justified. The article provoked outrage from many Iowans, who took offense at Bloom's negative tone, broad stereotypes, and factual errors. The article prompted a rebuttal by University of Iowa president Sally Mason (who said she was offended by it) , an op-ed by four of Bloom's colleagues in the University of Iowa School of Journalism and Mass Communication detailing their "profound and professional disagreement with Professor Bloom concerning the practice of 'good journalism,'" , and many other criticisms and parodies.

Personal life

Stephen Bloom is married, has a son, and lives in Iowa City, Iowa.

Bibliography

• Postville: A Clash of Cultures in Heartland America, Stephen G. Bloom, Harcourt, 2000.
• Inside the Writer's Mind: Writing Narrative Journalism, Stephen G. Bloom, Iowa State Press, 2002.
• The Swedish Wife in The Exquisite Corpse: A Journal of Letters and Life, 2003.

External links

• Audio of Bloom discussing Postville on NPR.
• Oxford Project Official Page