NPR People

Maria Hinojosa, NPR Biography

Host, Latino USA

Photo: Michael Paras

Award-winning journalist and author Maria Hinojosa is managing editor and host of Latino USA. In addition to hosting each week's show, Hinojosa is the senior correspondent for the Emmy Award -winning PBS newsmagazine NOW.

Before joining NOW, Hinojosa was the urban affairs correspondent for CNN. Prior to joining CNN, Hinojosa spent six years as a New York-based correspondent for NPR. During this time, she also hosted Visiones, a public affairs talk show on WNBC-TV in New York.

In 1991, Hinojosa worked for WNYC-TV as the host of New York Hotline, a live, primetime call-in public affairs show, and in 1990 worked for WNYC Radio as a general assignment correspondent.

From 1988 to 1989, Hinojosa served as a producer and researcher for CBS This Morning, and in 1987 worked for CBS Radio as a producer. Among the shows she produced for CBS Radio: Where We Stand with Walter Cronkite, The Osgood File and Newsbreak.

Throughout her career, Hinojosa has garnered several awards and honors. Three times since 1995, Hispanic Business Magazine has named her one of the 100 most influential Latinos in the United States. In 1995, Hinojosa received the Robert F. Kennedy award for "Manhood Behind Bars," a story for NPR, which documented how jail has become a right of passage for men of all races. In 1993, she received both the National Association of Hispanic Journalists Radio Award and the New York Society of Professional Journalists Deadline Award for her NPR report, "Kids and Guns." In 1991, she won a Unity Award and the Top Story of the Year Award from the National Association of Hispanic Journalists for her NPR story on gang members entitled "Crews." Also in 1991, Hinojosa won an Associated Press award for her coverage of Mandela for WNYC Radio.

In addition, Hinojosa authored the book Crews: Gang Members Talk with Maria Hinojosa (1995), which was based on her award-winning NPR report. Her second book, Raising Raul: Adventures Raising Myself and My Son, a motherhood memoir about raising a Latino child in a multicultural society, was published by Viking-Penguin in 2000. In 1999, Working Mothers Magazine named Hinojosa one of the 25 "Most Influential Working Mothers."

Hinojosa has also been a contributing essayist in the 2004 book, Borderline Personalities: A New Generation of Latinas dish on Sex, Sass and Cultural Shifting, edited by Robyn Moreno and Michelle Herrera Mulligan. Most recently, she has contributed an essay to the 2006 book, Why I Stay Married.

Born in Mexico City, Hinojosa is a magna cum laude graduate of Barnard College, where she majored in Latin American studies, political economy and women's studies. Hinojosa resides in New York City with her husband and their son and daughter.

Maria Hinojosa's Awards include: NAMME Catalyst Award from the National Association of Minority Media Executives (2005); NAHJ top television award for CNN documentary, "Immigrant Nation: Divided Country" (2005); Emmy recognition for coverage of the September 11th attacks (2002); Latino Heritage Award from the Latino Alumni Association of Columbia University (2002); Minerva Mirabal Award in communications from the Dominican Women's Caucus (2002); Lifetime achievement award from Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors (2005); Ruben Salazar Communications Award, National Council of La Raza (1999); Hispanic Business Magazine 100 Most Influential Latinos (1995); Robert F. Kennedy Award for Manhood Behind Bars (1995); National Association of Hispanic Journalists Radio Award for "Kids and Guns" (1993); New York Society of Professional Journalists Deadline Award for "Kids and Guns" (1993).