Roger Wilkins

Past chairman of the Pulitzer Prize Board, and now the Clarence J. Robinson Professor of History and American Culture at George Mason University, Roger Wilkins has broad experience in public affairs. During the Johnson administration, Wilkins served as assistant attorney general. In a distinguished journalism career, he has written for both The New York Times and The Washington Post, and he was associate editor of The Washington Star. While on the editorial page staff of The Washington Post, he shared a Pulitzer Prize in 1972 for Watergate coverage with Woodward, Bernstein and Herblock. His highly acclaimed autobiography, A Man’s Life (1982), was reprinted in 1991, and he was co- editor with Fred Harris of Quiet Riots in 1988. Among an array of public service activities, he served as past chair of the Board of Trustees of the Africa America Institute and is a member of the Board of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. He is publisher of NAACP’s journal Crisis and has served on the Board of Trustees of the University of the District of Columbia and on the District of Columbia Board of Education.

He teaches two upper-level interdisciplinary courses. The first traces our nation’s racial history beginning with our Colonial foundations down to the issues we currently confront, and the second examines how the technologies of journalism and communication have transformed American Presidential politics over the last 75 years. In a freshman seminar, he uses great literature to compare how culture has shaped individuals across time and societies. In an Honors course he uses literature, works of philosophy, and essays to examine the nature and the impacts of cultural arrangements that mold contemporary Americans. Wilkins holds a law degree from the University of Michigan. His book Jefferson’s Pillow; The Founding Fathers and the Dilemma of Black Patriotism was published in 2001 and won the 2002 NAIBA Book Award for Adult Non-Fiction.