Martina Guzman

Martina Guzmán is an award-winning journalist and documentary filmmaker. She is a 2023 John S. Knight Journalism Fellow at Stanford University. Martina is the founder and director of the Race & Justice Reporting Initiative at the Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights at Wayne State University Law School in Detroit, Michigan. As an independent journalist and documentary filmmaker, Martina covers race, justice, and systemic inequality. Her work has appeared on NPR, The Guardian, Slate, PBS, and Next City, among many others. Martina was the Detroit correspondent for The Takeaway, a radio news program co-created and co-produced by Public Radio International and WNYC. Her community reporting with Detroit's NPR affiliate, WDET, led to her being named Best Statewide Individual Reporter by the Associated Press. Her exploration into the rise and fall of global, post-industrial cities earned her the Best Series Award from the Michigan Broadcasters Association and Best Investigative Series from the Associated Press of Michigan. She has received numerous grants and reporting fellowships, including fellowships from New American Media and the German Marshall Fund. Martina received a Ford Foundation reporting grant to investigate the impacts of water shut-offs for women of color in South Africa and Detroit. Martina has helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for media organizations committed to centering BIPOC and immigrant voices. She believes we must increase pay to independent journalists and that community and freelance reporters are the backbone of a healthy democracy. Martina is a graduate of the Journalism School at Columbia University in New York City and the proud daughter of Mexican immigrants.