Karen Coates
CEJ Ambassador

Karen CoatesÌýis an independent author, editor, and media trainer who covers food, environment, health, and human rights globally. She and her husband,ÌýJerryÌýRedfernÌý(Scripps Fellow 2012-13), are in post-production on a documentary film about unexploded ordnance in Laos decades after history’s largest bombing campaign. Karen is a fellow with the International Women’s Media Foundation, president of the Rio Grande Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, and a contributing editor for Archaeology Magazine. She is also at work on a long-term project to investigate child labor in US agriculture, which began with a long-form story for Pacific Standard and will continue as an audio documentary. She is the author of four books, including (withÌýJerry)ÌýEternal Harvest: The Legacy of American Bombs in Laos, which was a finalist for the IRE Book Award. Karen conducts international journalism trainings, and, most recently, participated in an IREX media exchange between journalists in New Mexico and the country of Georgia.