Adrian Nicole LeBlanc is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 journalist whose works focus on the marginalized members of society: adolescents living in poverty, prostitutes, women in prison, etc. She is best known for her 2003 non-fiction

Non-fiction

Non-fiction is the form of any narrative, account, or other communicative work whose assertions and descriptions are understood to be fact...

 book Random Family

Random Family

thumb|right|Paperback editionRandom Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx is a 2003 narrative non-fiction study of urban life by American writer Adrian Nicole LeBlanc.-Summary:...

. She was a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship -- popularly known as the "Genius Grant" -- in 2006.

Background and education

LeBlanc grew up in a working class family in Leominster, Massachusetts

Leominster, Massachusetts

Leominster is a city in Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the second-largest city in Worcester County, with a population of 40,759 at the 2010 census. Leominster is located north of Worcester and west of Boston. Both Route 2 and Route 12 pass through Leominster. Interstate 190,...

. She studied at Smith College

Smith College

Smith College is a private, independent women's liberal arts college located in Northampton, Massachusetts. It is the largest member of the Seven Sisters...

, Oxford

Oxford

The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...

, and Yale University

Yale University

Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

. She worked for Seventeen Magazine

Seventeen (magazine)

Seventeen is an American magazine for teenagers. It was first published in September 1944 by Walter Annenberg's Triangle Publications. News Corporation bought Triangle in 1988, and sold Seventeen to K-III Communications in 1991. Primedia sold the magazine to Hearst in 2003. It is still in the...

 as an editor after earning her Master's degree in Modern Literature at Oxford.

Random Family

LeBlanc's first book, Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx, took more than 10 years to research and write. Random Family is a nonfiction account of the struggles of two women and their family as they deal with love, drug dealers, babies and prison time in the Bronx. LeBlanc and Random Family garnered several awards and nominations. Her research methods earned her a spot among several other journalists and nonfiction writers in Robert Boynton's book, The New New Journalism.

Journalism

LeBlanc has contributed to the New York Times Magazine, the Village Voice, and Esquire magazine. She currently lives in Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

.

Academic

Adrian Nicole LeBlanc was a Holtzbrink Fellow at the American Academy in Berlin

American Academy in Berlin

The American Academy in Berlin is a research and cultural institution in Berlin whose stated mission is to foster a greater understanding and dialogue between the people of the United States and the people of Germany.The American Academy was founded in September 1994 by a group of prominent...

, Germany, for Spring 2009. She is a Visiting Scholar at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University 2009-2010. She will be part of the Harman Writer-in-Residence Program at Baruch College

Baruch College

Bernard M. Baruch College, more commonly known as Baruch College, is a constituent college of the City University of New York, located in the Flatiron district of Manhattan, New York City. With an acceptance rate of just 23%, Baruch is among the most competitive and diverse colleges in the nation...

in Spring 2011.

Other publications

• "Gang Girl: When Manny’s Locked-Up" (August, 1994)
• "Landing From the Sky" (The New Yorker, April 23, 2000)
• "When the Man of the House is in the Big House" (Cover, January, 2003)
• "Sidelines" (About the work of Swiss artist Uwe Wittwer
  Uwe Wittwer
  Uwe Wittwer is a Swiss artist. He lives and works in Zürich, Switzerland. The media he uses include watercolor, oil painting, inkjet prints and video.-Life and work:...
  
  , in "Geblendet / Dazzled": Kehrer, Heidelberg, 2005)
• "'The Ground We Lived On': A Father's Last Days" (documenting the last months of her father's life, on NPR's All Things Considered, 2006)

Awards

1. Margolis Award (2000)
2. Lettre Ulysses Award (2003)
3. New York Times Best Books of the Year (2003)
4. Borders Original Voices Award for Nonfiction
5. MacArthur Fellow
   MacArthur Fellows Program
   The MacArthur Fellows Program or MacArthur Fellowship is an award given by the John D. and Catherine T...
   
   (2006)

External links

• Adrian Ncole LeBlanc on NPR about Random Family
• The New York Times Book Review on Random Family
• Adrian Nicole LeBlanc website
• Robert S. Boynton in The New Journalism on Adrian LeBlanc and Random Family
• Boy George website, including LeBlanc's reporting of Random Family
• Adrian Nicole LeBlanc in The New York Times Magazine on Education in Hollywood