Gretchen L. Wilson is a radio and print journalist currently based in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Since 2004, Gretchen has reported throughout eastern and southern Africa - from Sudan to Zimbabwe - for international news outlets, including Marketplace, The World, Slate, IRIN News, and BBC’s World Today. Her passions include globalization, economic development and trade; human rights and humanitarian affairs; HIV/AIDS and public health; and race and identity.
Gretchen is a co-author, with Beulah Thumbadoo, of From Dust to Diamonds: Stories of South African Social Entrepreneurs, a book profiling innovative civil society leaders in South Africa. The book is published by Pan Macmillan.
Prior to relocating to Johannesburg, Gretchen lived in Brooklyn and worked as an equities reporter at Dow Jones Newswires. Her stories were routinely reprinted by The Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, The Miami Herald, The Los Angeles Times, and Newsday. She also worked as an adjunct instructor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.
In 1998 she was a founder of WashTech, the first labor union for “new economy” workers in the United States.
Gretchen holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology and Multi-Ethnic Studies from Bard College and an Master of Science degree in Journalism from Columbia University.
