Wendy Paris is a journalist and author. During her fellowship year, she authored Splitopia: The Good News About Today’s Divorce and How to Part Well (Atria/Simon & Schuster, 2016). Part memoir, part journalism, part history of marriage, Splitopia looks at how changes in laws and customs over the past 50 years have greatly improved divorce for many, as have women’s increased earning power, advances in psychology and technology, a greater understanding of child development, and a growing acknowledgment of the importance of fathers. It challenges the assumption that all happy families must look alike.
She has since co-written books on the artisan industry in the global south, what’s really going on in the pet food industry, and how to rise and thrive within organizations. Her articles, essays, and opinion pieces have appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Psychology Today, Inside Philanthropy, Quartz, the Forward, Jewish Journal, and other publications and website, as well as on Marketplace radio, WNBC-TV, and PBS. She has also presented stories-on-stage at theaters around Los Angeles. She was a 2012 Social Purpose Fellow through Encore.org, serving as the director of communications for Sustainable South Bronx.
She is a graduate of the University of Houston and holds an M.F.A. in creative nonfiction writing from Columbia University and an MSW from The Ohio State University School of Social Work. As an MSW student, she worked at JFS Care, a division of Jewish Family Service LA that provides caregivers for older Angelenos. She is the mother of one son and lives in Santa Monica, CA.
