Maya Schenwar is a writer, editor, journalist and organizer who has spent the last 20 years working tosculpt new ways for journalism to serve the public good and fuel social transformation. She spent 13 years as Editor-in-Chief of Truthout, an independent social justice news publication, and is currently the organization’s Editor-at-Large and Board President. Recently, Maya founded the Truthout Center for Grassroots Journalism. She is the co-author (with Victoria Law) of Prison by Any Other Name: The Harmful Consequences of Popular Reforms (The New Press, July 2020), and the author of Locked Down, Locked Out: Why Prison Doesn’t Work and How We Can Do Better (Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2014). Both books challenge the ingrained logic of prison and policing that holds our society captive, and share the work of bold and creative efforts to uproot the prison-industrial complex. Maya is also the co-editor (with Joe Macaré and Alana Yu-Lan Price) of Who Do You Serve, Who Do You Protect? Police Violence and Resistance in the United States, an anthology focused on the entrenched racism and violence of policing and the fight to dismantle that institution. She authored a chapter in The Long Term: Resisting Life Sentences, Working Toward Freedom, and co-authored a chapter in the anthology Welcome to the Revolution: Universalizing Resistance for Social Justice and Democracy in Perilous Times, with Alana Yu-Lan Price.
Maya has written op-eds and news articles for Truthout, The New York Times, The Guardian, NBC News THINK, The Nation, The New Jersey Star-Ledger, Ms. Magazine, Prison Legal News, Salon, Slate, and many other publications, mostly focusing on prisons, policing, surveillance, institutionalization, abolition, war, imperialism, drug policy, and media. She has also written articles on parenting for Motherwell and Scary Mommy, and fiction for the Baltimore Review.
Maya gave a Tedx talk on prison abolition, and has been a keynote speaker in a wide range of settings. She was recognized as one of NewCity Chicago‘s “Lit 50” and a “Writer of the Moment” in 2021. She is the recipient of a Society of Professional Journalists Sigma Chi Award, a Lannan Residency Fellowship, the Women’s Prison Association’s Sarah Powell Huntington Leadership Award, Truthout’s Flame of Truth Award, and a Women to Celebrate Award, and her books have won awards including Independent Publisher Book Awards and a Society of Midland Authors honor. An essay she wrote while in labor with her child was selected as a “notable essay” in The Best American Essays, 2019. Maya’s co-authored book, Prison by Any Other Name, was a finalist for the Bernstein Prize. Her body of work was recognized by congregation Tzedek Chicago through a 2021 event, “Joy in the Struggle: A Fundraiser for Tzedek Chicago Honoring Maya Schenwar.” Under Maya’s co-leadership, Truthout won a 2021 Izzy Award from the Park Center for Independent Media, and a 2022 Synapses Award from the Crossroads Fund. Through the Truthout Center for Grassroots Journalism, Maya co-founded a collaboration between 11 movement media organizations to uplift accurate coverage of Israel’s genocide against Gaza. She is co-facilitating ongoing collaborations between Truthout and Zealous, Teen Vogue, Inquest, Deceleration, and other partner organizations; the Truthout/Zealous/Teen Vogue collaborative series won a 2024 Anthem Award.
Maya organizes with the Chicago-based collective Love & Protect (previously the Chicago Alliance to Free Marissa Alexander), which supports women and gender non-conforming people of color who are criminalized or harmed by state and interpersonal violence. She is a co-founder of the Chicago Community Bond Fund (CCBF), which pays bond for people incarcerated in Cook County Jail and works toward the abolition of money bond and pretrial incarceration. She is a member of the boards of directors for Waging Nonviolence and Just Foreign Policy, and the advisory boards of the Children’s Best Interest Project and Knock LA‘s Incarceration Reporting Initiative, as well as the editorial collective that produces the prison newsletter Stateville Speaks. Maya was formerly chair of the coordinating committee of the Media Consortium. Maya also serves as a member of the Jewish Voice for Peace advisory committee on the “Deadly Exchange” project, working to end the US/Israel police training exchange programs.
Maya has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, including The New Yorker Radio Hour (NPR), Democracy Now!, C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal,” MSNBC’s “The Shift,” Al Jazeera’s “The Stream,” The Thom Hartmann Show, Wisconsin Public Radio, Minnesota Public Radio, San Francisco Public Radio, The Majority Report, WBAI, KPFK, and many more. Previous to her work at Truthout, Maya was Contributing Editor at Punk Planet magazine, writing about antiwar activism, Palestinian solidarity, LGBTQ liberation, feminism, death penalty organizing, and more. She also served as media coordinator for Voices for Creative Nonviolence, and helped to organize actions against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Maya lives in Chicago with her partner, Ryan, and toddler, Kai. Her (unpaid) work as a mother inspires and drives much of her writing, speaking, and organizing, as she imagines a future grounded in principles of nurturing, care, mutual aid, support, love, and a deep recognition of the humanity of all people.