Karen Grigsby Bates
Karen Grigsby Bates is the Senior Correspondent for Code Switch, a podcast that reports on race and ethnicity. A veteran NPR reporter, Bates covered race for the network for several years before becoming a founding member of the Code Switch team. She is especially interested in stories about the hidden history of race in America—and in the intersection of race and culture. She oversees much of Code Switch's coverage of books by and about people of color, as well as issues of race in the publishing industry. Bates is the co-author of a best-selling etiquette book (Basic Black: Home Training for Modern Times) and two mystery novels; she is also a contributor to several anthologies of essays. She lives in Los Angeles and reports from NPR West.
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The Kennedy administration commemorated the Emancipation Proclamation with a reception for a virtual who's who of black Americans. However, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. stayed away. -
A new law provides a path to temporary legal status for some youth in the U.S. illegally, but families must produce a bevy of documentation to qualify. In California, some school districts have devised new systems to help manage the high demand for data and school transcripts.
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The producer of an upcoming Nina Simone biopic has cast Afro-Latina actress Zoe Saldana in the lead role — a move that's proved controversial. Critics say that while Saldana is a talented actress, she's too close to traditional light-skinned Hollywood beauty standards. -
From murder in the Venice canals to human trafficking in the desert, Los Angeles serves as the perfect setting for Robert Crais' noir novels, starring Elvis Cole and Joe Pike, two PIs who are desperately seeking normal — both for their clients and themselves. -
Andy Cohen made the cable channel an unlikely focus of water-cooler talk by developing the Real Housewives series. After work, he hosts a nightly talk show — and he's not looking to stop doing either anytime soon. -
The idea of an "affordable manicure" was once an oxymoron. That's before Vietnamese immigrants arrived in the U.S. and cornered the market for inexpensive nail-care salons. The industry has offered a path to self-sufficiency for many Vietnamese-Americans in California and around the nation. -
In his new memoir, Rodney King explains why he gave his famous "Can we get along?" speech when riots erupted after police officers were acquitted in his beating. His lawyers had drafted a far angrier script for him. He also reflects on his life since the trial: "Things have changed for me," he says. -
In a nation where child obesity rates are soaring, some parents are turning to a boarding school that focuses on both weight loss and academics. The goal: to rewire students' eating and exercise habits to ensure they live long and healthy lives. The kids find it a challenge — but totally worth it. -
Fifteen years after she led the prosecution against O.J. Simpson in one of the most public trials of the century, Marcia Clark returns to the courtroom. But this time, it's to make her fiction debut as the writer of a new legal thriller novel, Guilt by Association.. -
The South and West may become the Rust Belts of the 21st century, according to a new study from the Mortgage Bankers Association. It says the economies in these regions — in places like California and Florida — may never fully recover from the burst of the housing bubble.
