Leonard Pitts

Bio

Leonard Pitts Jr. joined The Miami Herald in 1991 as its pop music critic and has penned a syndicated column focusing on pop culture, social issues and family life since 1994. Pitts is the author of six books, including "Becoming Dad: Black Men and the Journey to Fatherhood," published in 1999.

Pitts has been writing professionally since 1976, when, as an 18-year-old college student, he began writing freelance reviews and profiles for Soul, a national black entertainment tabloid. In 1978, he became its editor. In the years since, Pitts' work has appeared in such publications as Musician, Spin, TV Guide, Reader's Digest and Parenting. In addition, he wrote, produced and syndicated "Who We Are," an award-winning 1988 radio documentary on the history of black America, and has written and produced numerous other radio programs on subjects as diverse as Madonna and Martin Luther King Jr. Pitts was also a writer for radio's popular countdown program, "Casey's Top 40 with Casey Kasem."

Pitts is a four-time winner of the American Association of Sunday and Feature Editors' Award for Excellence in Commentary, a five-time winner of the National Headliners Award given by the Press Club of Atlantic City, and a six-time winner of the Green Eyeshade Award given by the Society of Professional Journalists. The Florida Society of Newspaper Editors, the National Association of Black Journalists, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the American Society of Newspaper Editors, Editor and Publisher magazine and GLAAD Media, among others, have also honored him. In 2002, the National Society of Newspaper Columnists awarded Pitts its inaugural Columnist of the Year award, and in 2004 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for commentary.