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Talks @ Pulitzer: Ameto Akpe and Allison Shelley on Women's Health in Nigeria

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May 21, 2014 | 5:30 PM
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English

U.S. development projects target northern Nigeria where poverty, illiteracy and radical Islam shape...

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Abiodun Ibrahim, 24, an unemployed Nigerian woman, is four months pregnant by a common law husband who is in jail. Image by Allison Shelley. Nigeria, 2013.

Join us on Wednesday, May 21 for a conversation with Pulitzer Center grantees Ameto Akpe and Allison Shelley about their work reporting on women's health in Nigeria. Shelley will share her work documenting access to family planning options for Nigerian women, and Akpe will present her coverage of foreign aid in Nigeria and its impact on the country's women's health initiatives.

Akpe, a Nigerian print journalist, was the 2013 Persephone Miel fellow and a Nieman fellow at Harvard University. In her Pulitzer Center-supported project, "Nigeria: U.S. Dollars and Dubious Results," Akpe explores the impact of U.S. foreign aid in northern Nigeria, asking just how much this money has been able to change health outcomes in the region, and how these displays of American "soft power" will be affected by the rise of Boko Haram, an anti-Western, anti-Christian, and anti-democratic group.

Shelley is an independent documentary photographer and multimedia creator. In her project, "Deadly Cycle: Nigeria's Silent Abortion Crisis," along with journalist Allyn Gaestel, Shelley portrays the struggles for Nigerian women as they navigate the country's reproductive health laws. Contraception is difficult to obtain and with limited access to family planning, one third of Nigerian women have experienced an unwanted pregnancy. Unfortunately, many of these women turn to abortion, which is illegal and dangerous.

We'll start the evening with a light reception at 5:30 pm, followed by remarks at 6 pm.
Reserve your seat today: [email protected]—specify in subject line: "May 21 Talks @ Pulitzer."

Wednesday, May 21
5:30-7pm

Pulitzer Center

1779 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Suite 615

Washington, DC 20036

Closest Metro: Dupont Circle


The event will be livestreamed using Google Hangout on Air. Watch above (refresh the page if you do not see a video) or on YouTube. Tweet your questions to @pulitzercenter.

This talk is the fourth in a special series of talks @ pulitzer on issues affecting women and children. The series kicked off in April 2014 with two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Larry C. Price and his work on child labor in the gold mining industry. Other events in the series will feature the work of Pulitzer Center journalists such as Mellissa Fung on the education of girls in Afghanistan, Katherine Zoepf on Saudi women entering the workforce, Steve Sapienza on sex workers in Cambodia who are battling stigma and HIV, and Amy Toensing on widows in India who are both unwanted and unprotected. Details to follow.

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