Arun Venugopal is an American journalist. He covers news regardingrace,immigration,gender, andidentity in theUnited States. He is currently Senior Reporter in the Race & Justice Unit atWNYC, New York Public Radio, where he has worked since 2015 and where he created and the hosted the program called "Micropolis", which features aspects of New York City's ethnically diverse communities.[1][2][3] Among the topics he has addressed is the idea ofAsian-Americans as the "model minority" and how its discourses can perpetuate diverse patterns ofracism towards nonwhite groups, as well asxenophobia towards immigrants.[4][5] Venugopal also writes forGothamist.[6]
Arun Venugopal grew up inPiney Point, a suburb ofHouston, Texas, as the son of parents who immigrated fromKerala,India, in 1978.[7][4] He has reflected on these experiences while critiquing ideas of Indian-American, and more broadly Asian-American, exceptionalism in the United States, and on the circumstances by which "the U.S. engineered the conditions that allowed certain nonwhite groups to thrive".[5] In 2017 he collected narratives of white working-class Americans who voted forDonald J. Trump for U.S. president, in order to understand their motives and concerns.[8] In his reporting he has also examined the political and cultural consciousness of theSouth Asian diaspora in the United States.[9]
He received a Master of Arts in Media Studies fromThe New School.[10] He has contributed to radio, print journalism, and digital journalism reporting in venues includingNational Public Radio (NPR) in its "Morning Edition" and "All Things Considered" programs,Slate,PBS Newshour,The Guardian,The Wall Street Journal,The New York Times,Salon,The New York Post, theAssociated Press, and more.[10]
In 2010, Venugopal created WNYC New York Public Radio's program calledMicropolis, which aims to feature New York City's ethnically diverse communities while making "big, anonymous city just a little bit more knowable." Past episodes have featured topics ranging from Blackprotest music and the New York roots ofTrumpistIslamophobia, toChristmas festivities among non-Christians, JewishTalmudic study conferences, and theTibetan community ofJackson Heights.[3] Following the onset of theCOVID-19 pandemic, an episode in 2020 considered the challenges facing New York City's restaurant, bar, and food vendor scene and discussed how residents could support these businesses amid closures.[11]
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