Helena Cavendish de Moura
https://www.helenacavendishdemoura.com
Freelance Journalist
I am a freelance journalist with a distinguished career in foreign news. At present, I am working for Lead Stories, contributing articles for CNN’s photography page and occasionally reporting on Latin America. I have worked in dozens of countries and speak fluent Portuguese, Italian, Spanish and English.
Education: Bachelors in Journalism and Mass Communications, The University of Georgia, 1994 with a Minor in Italian Literature (National Honors Society).
Awards
2001-Society of Professional Journalists Green Eyeshade Award (Georgia Public Radio).
2001-The Associated Press award for Investigative Reporting (Georgia Public Radio), FIRST PLACE.
Work Experience
At present:
Lead Stories: Editing, news gathering, fact-checking.
Casa Forte Publishing: Editing, translating and marketing of emerging authors. www.casafortepress.com
RECENT ASSIGNMENTS:
2019 to 2020: WABE/NPR: Daily news assignment reporter (RADIO)
2009 to 2019: CNN International Assignment Editor, Photoblog Writer: I’ve written and published dozens of essay-style articles on emerging photographers and their daring concepts.
2013: (CNN) POPE VISITS BRAZIL: Wire reporter/field producer/live coordinator: traveled through Brazil’s favelas during Pope Francis’s first trip to Brazil. http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2013/07/25/in-address-to-youth-in-brazil-pope-francis-speaks-their-language/
2013: Producer/ wire reporter/Santa Maria Disco Fire tragedy:
++Field reporting and producing on the Santa Maria fire tragedy, one of the deadliest in Brazil’s history, where 240 people, mostly college students, died in a popular nightclub. https://edition.cnn.com/2013/01/29/world/americas/brazil-nightclub-fire-main/index.html
CNN wires/International Assignment Editor/Field reporter
++Wrote wire-style updates for CNN.com and Wires.CNN on a range of news stories with some added features on the Americas such as:
++Brazil/security: Wrote news pieces on the state of violence in several regions in Brazil.
++Venezuela/Chavez health: reported on the health status of former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez.
++Brazil/Lula: Brazilian former president underwent chemotherapy, corruption scandals, environment and more.
2011 CNN LIVE Reporter, Rio de Janeiro Floods:
++Traveled and reported live from flood hit areas outside of Rio de Janeiro while also filing packages.
2007 AC360 Planet in Peril: Brazil–Field Producer.
++Originated, researched and set up all stories related to the Amazon.
Traveled to some of the worlds remotest indigenous villages with Anderson Cooper and Jeff Corwin.
++Organized all live transmissions through Embratel Brazil from the forest.
Provided editorial guidance in the field and during post production.
2008 CNNI Eco Solutions Program–-Correspondent
++Guyana/Carbon credits: Sat face-to-face with Guyanese President Bharrat Jagdeo and talked about his daring proposal to monetize on the work of his nation’s vast tropical forests by cashing in on the clean air it provides.
2008 Guyana: Green Billionaire
++Helena de Moura flies in the jet of one of the world’s richest businessmen to talk about his real-estate purchase: A slice of the Amazon of greater than London.
2006: CNNI/Eye on Brazil-Connects: Reporter, Field Producer, Guest Producer.
++Taped at the Museum of Contemporary Architecture in Niteroi, Rio de Janeiro, I worked with Jim Clancy and CNNI on this Brazil special which featured some of Brazil’s most prominent newsmakers and personalities. The show tossed to a variety of colorful packages by CNN veteran reporters Tim Lister, Jim Clancy, and Karl Penhaul. My news pieces included:
++Rocinha, Lula’s re-election
++Brazil’s Haute Couture
++Brazilian Models
++Anniversary of favela massacre.
2003-2004 The Associated Press Television, Assignment Manager for Latin America.
++Responsible for overseeing breaking news coverage on Latin America.
++Coordinated coverage with staff and freelancers in 35 bureaus.
++Guided producers, cameramen and writers for production of hourly bulletins and APTN’s newsfeed. Worked on tight deadlines.
++Generated news stories, feature pieces and very completive on breaking news stories.
CNNI, Global Challenges, Correspondent. 2002-2003
++Sustainable Tourism in Costa Rica: An eight-minute television report on the country’s attempt to balance its large influx of tourists while preserving all natural resources.
++Solar Power in the Amazon Forest: A 10-minute report from one of the remotest places on earth, the Xixuaú-Xipariná Reserve, where solar power is keeping locals from destroying the forest.
++Brazil/Ethanol: a look at Brazil’s revolutionary ethanol program.
The Atlanta Constitution, Contributor for Atlanta and The World. 2002-2003
++Contributor for a weekly column on international news, bridging Atlanta’s interests to the world.
Georgia Public Radio and Television, Freelance Reporter 1999-2002
++Reporter for the Georgia Gazette as well as the Georgia Business Report.
National Geographic Television, Correspondent. 2002
++The Forgotten Children of Colombia, a one-hour documentary on the legacy of Colombia’s civil war on its children.
The Weather Channel, Anchor. 2001
++Anchored for TWC’s Latin America division in Portuguese.
Produced and anchored weekend travel show in English.
Reuters News Agency, Stringer. 1999 to 2001.
++Wrote daily breaking news copy on Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi.
Managed bureau affairs while working on daily news stories from the South.
CNN WORLD REPORT-ANGOLA REPORTER—2002
Reported and packaged stories on the Angolan peace process, traveled with then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and U.S. ambassador Madeleine Albright through war ravage areas to meet with warring parties, including UNITA warlord Jonas Savimbi.
WIRES CNN, Freelance Writer 1998-2001.
Wrote daily breaking news copy on international stories. Covered extensively the Kosovo war and the Paris peace talks that followed.
CNN, International Assignment Editor: 1996 to 1998.
Assigned and coverage with staff and freelancers in all CNN’s international bureaus.
Worked with reporters and crews on breaking news events.
Met hourly deadlines for breaking news with several different networks.
References Available Upon Request
Statement of purpose
“It was the fallacy that one can interpret the world only by means of what it chooses to show us in the hours of its convulsions… But might it not be possible to pierce that spectacular stereotype, to move beyond imagery, attempt to reach deeper?”
Ryszard Kapuscinski, Travels With Herodotus.
I have been working as a journalist for more than a decade, covering Latin America and Luso-Africa for a number of television networks such as CNN, National Geographic and the Associated Press Television. My profession has allowed me unique opportunities to cover unique stories in Latin America. I have traveled with guerilla forces in Colombia and spent a considerable amount of time in Latin American shanties with drug lords and activists. I have also been fortunate to have traveled many miles through some of the remotest areas of the Amazon.
Every experience has left me with a restless desire to know more about these regions and their histories, to deepen my knowledge of this continent still considerably unexplored in terms of news. Unfortunately, the fast-paced nature of journalism in the United States at times leaves us with limited opportunity to develop a deeper analytical view of such events. As Ryszard Kapuscinski mentions in the quote above, every news story leaves us with the empty bullet shells of the world’s conflicts and its “hours of convulsions.”
We are often at fault, especially in regards to Latin America, of perpetuating stereotypes and deepening the cultural chasm between the hemispheres.
My experience as a journalist in Latin America has re-emphasized the obvious: in the eyes of European and United States journalists, Latin America’s image is still calcified into the old stereotypes still common at the turn of the century.
In this context, I see my possible enrollment at Georgia State’s Masters program in History as an opportunity to deepen my knowledge on the very events I set out to cover, to engage in comparative research that will guide me through my intellectual exploits of Latin America, understanding and exploring its unique position in the world.
As a Brazilian, Latin America I have a fascination for the colorful rhetoric of its regional poets and writers, politicians and historians whose discourse adorns facts with symbolic weight. It is the continent of Octavio Paz, Eduardo Galeano, Machado de Assis and many others whose genius continue to influence and define a new generation and its political leadership.
Dynamism and vitality defines these societies. Latin Americans are xxxxx self made…. whose struggles against dictatorship, hyperinflation and
And I have been witnessed to the exponential growth in the continent’s impave a fasciortance … a growing interest in the news ma.
Immersing myself in the issues…. Academically… while bringing with me the real life experiences
Helena, impressive work history. Your link to the “Fighting Feminicide with Theatre” article should be: https://mulheresdesoledesangre.wordpress.com/blog/ and the “ni” in the middle of Femicide is a typo. (Since this note has a correction for you to make, you don’t need to approve it to show, but I wanted you to be able to make the correction!)
Thank you so much!