Moira was an executive at MTV Networks International, working to launch the network throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, and Africa, as well as producing series and programming music for MTV India. Previously, she was part of the startup team that launched Outlook, now one of India’s most widely read news magazines, and she worked at India Today's classical record label Music Today. She is a graduate of St. Stephen's College, Delhi.

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Sarah was most recently associate editorial director at Center Theatre Group, one of the country's largest nonprofit theatres. Until 2015 she was the editor and associate publisher of Zócalo Public Square, and since then she has served as book prize editor. She began her career at Alfred A. Knopf and W. W. Norton working on a wide variety of fiction and nonfiction titles, from award-winning novels and short story collections to bestselling memoirs and cookbooks.

Joe was a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the Baltimore Sun. He is co-author of California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It and author of The People’s Machine: Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Rise of Blockbuster Democracy. He is co-president of the Global Forum on Modern Direct Democracy.

Sara graduated from the College of William & Mary and received her MFA at the California Institute of the Arts, where she held a postgraduate fellowship. Her work as a filmmaker has screened at festivals in the U.S. and abroad.

Jackie is a writer and editor based in L.A. Previously the assistant arts and culture digital editor for Smithsonian magazine, she holds an MA from Columbia Journalism School.

Talib has worked as a research associate at the Public Policy Institute of California and research assistant at the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Institute based in Gothenburg, Sweden. He is a doctoral candidate in literature and critical race and ethnic studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Naledi graduated from Michigan State University with a B.A. in Social Relations and Policy. She previously coordinated events for a non-profit travel organization. She also has an interest and background in diversity and inclusion.

Arianna graduated from UCLA with a BA in Art History. She received an Arts for LA ACTIVATE Fellowship in Cultural Policy in 2018 as well as a Gilman International Scholarship to study abroad in London.

Joel Garcia (Huichol) is an Indigenous artist and cultural organizer who uses Indigenous-based frameworks to center those most impacted, and arts-based strategies such as printmaking, installations, creative action, and altar-making to raise awareness of issues facing underserved communities, youth, and other targeted populations. In various roles, he has worked with Indigenous communities across borders in support of issues of land, access, and self-determination. His work explores healing and reconciliation, as well as memory and place. He’s a former fellow of Monument Lab, and the Intercultural Leadership Institute as well as artist-in-residence at Oxy Arts and AIR (Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator).

Mi-Ai Parrish is managing director of ASU Media Enterprise and Sue Clark-Johnson Professor of Media Innovation and Leadership at the Cronkite School. She's a longtime journalist and media executive, including president and publisher of USA TODAY Arizona, azcentral.com and the Arizona Republic.

Erin Yunt is the Assistant Vice President of Executive Administration at Arizona State University where she leads the team that manages Zocalo’s finances. She is a double Sun Devil with a BS in Business Management and a Master’s in Public Administration.

Suzanne is a senior media relations representative for Zócalo’s Knowledge Enterprise partner, Arizona State University. She has been a journalist and executive news producer and also directed communications and strategy for a successful statewide campaign in support of working families in Arizona.

Eryn is a Los Angeles-based writer who has reported on science, health, business, and a variety of other subjects. A former staff member at the Los Angeles Times and at Fortune Magazine, she has also written stories for The New York Times, Wired, Nature, and other outlets. She graduated from Harvard College in 1993.

Thea is trained as an artist and a cultural historian. She has taught writing at Art Center College of Design for fifteen years and holds a B.A. from Yale and an M.F.A. from the University of Iowa.

Gabrielle is a Brooklyn-based writer and editor with bylines in Esquire and Vice. She holds an M.A. in arts and culture writing from Columbia Journalism School.

Connie is the author of 5 books of poems, most recently The Bower. A finalist for the LA Times Book Award, her poems have been published in The New Yorker, Poetry Magazine and elsewhere. A native of northern Maine, she lives and works in southern New Mexico and Chicago.

Stefan is a Los Angeles-based brand designer, illustrator, and writer. He is the author of seven books, including the best-selling 344 Questions—The Creative Person’s Do-It-Yourself Guide to Insight, Survival & Artistic Fulfillment. He was named a Young Gun by the Art Directors Club of New York and is a recipient of D&AD’s Yellow Pencil for book design.

Be is a Los Angeles-based artist who works in animation, digital illustration, painting, woodcarving, and photography. She has had solo exhibitions at Sheila Olsen Gallery in Laguna Beach and ArtShareLA.

Lisa has written for publications including The Atlantic, Scientific American, and Wired and has written two books—Oil On the Brain: Petroleum's Long, Strange Trip to Your Tank (2007) and Underbug: An Obsessive Tale of Termites and Technology (2018). An editor at Zócalo from 2016–2020, she is now at Issues in Science and Technology.

Asha Rangappa is a Senior Lecturer at Yale University’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs and a legal and national security analyst for CNN. She is a former Associate Dean at Yale Law School and previously served as a Special Agent in the New York Division of the FBI, specializing in counterintelligence investigations.

Jennifer Mercieca, a historian of American political rhetoric, is a Professor in the Department of Communication at Texas A&M University. She is the author of Founding Fictions, The Rhetoric of Heroic Expectations: Establishing the Obama Presidency, and Demagogue For President: The Rhetorical Genius of Donald Trump.

Dr. Cynthia Greenlee is a North Carolina-based historian specializing in the legal history of Black girls and women in the 19th-century U.S. South. A seasoned journalist, her essays and articles have appeared in the Nation, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Scalawag, among other publications. Greenlee is currently the senior editor with the Counter, a nonprofit newsroom covering the business, politics, and culture of food.

James C. Cobb is a Distinguished Professor in History of the American South at the University of Georgia. He has published 13 books focusing on the interaction of economy, politics, and culture in the American South. A former president of the Southern Historical Association, he was recently inducted into the Georgia Writers Hall of Fame.

José González Vargas is a Venezuelan journalist and writer. Formerly a professor at Universidad Bicentenaria de Aragua, he has contributed to Americas Quarterly, Into, Caracas Chronicles, and ViceVersa Magazine. His literary work, written in Spanish and English, has been published by Strange Horizons, Letralia, and Fireside Quarterly. In 2017 he won the Solsticios Prize, Venezuela's top science fiction and fantasy award, for his short story "E Pluribus Unum.”