Lara Farrar

I am an award-winning journalist with more than 20 years of domestic and global experience, covering regional, national and international stories from Arkansas, Boston, New York, London, Latin America, North Africa, Southeast Asia and Asia, including China, where I was based for nearly a decade. In 2023, I was awarded a USC Annenberg Center for Health Journalism Data Fellowship and Engagement Grant to fuel a data-driven investigative approach for a multi-part series focusing on government policy, specifically the regulatory framework for child psychiatric facilities in Arkansas. I specialize in geopolitical analysis, public health, trade, technology, supply chain management, brand management, authoritarian regimes, censorship, higher education, agriculture, clean energy, climate change, and general human interest reporting. My reporting has won numerous state, regional and national awards. My clients include CNN, CNN International, the Wall Street Journal, McClatchy, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Women's Wear Daily, the Economist, The New York Times, WBUR-Boston, the Boston Globe, the Christian Science Monitor, and Vogue Canada, among others. Public relations clients include: Morgan Stanley, Weber Shandwick, Ogilvy, and Youku.com.

Featured Articles

IHT Rendezvous •

The Tension of Teaching Journalism in China

Can you teach journalism without free speech?

Western foreign correspondents — Peter Arnett, the Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent among them — are increasingly becoming university professors in China, in a nation that wants international expertise but also grapples with its own issues with free speech.

As Lara Farrar reports from Shantou, China, professors say they are relatively free to address some sensitive subjects, although some say they hold back on controversial topics.

At more
Index on Censorship •

My Shanghai next door neighbour is Chinese dissident Feng Zhenghu

This piece originally appeared on the Huffington Post and is cross-posted with the author’s permission

Just down the street from Fudan University, one of the top colleges in China, and across from a massive shopping complex that has a Wal Mart, a couple of Starbucks and KFCs, H&M, Sephora and Zara, among other Western brands, lives Feng Zhenghu who for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week is barred from leaving his home.

In 2009, Feng garnered international media attention when he lived in Tokyo’s Na