An Evening with Kara Swisher & Mary Barra

An Evening with Kara Swisher & Mary Barra

April 1 at 8:00 pm – 9:00 pm EDT

Program Description:

Join PBS Books as we offer a special evening with best-selling author, Kara Swisher, and General Motors Chair and CEO Mary Barra, which is being presented by the University of Michigan’s Wallace House Center for Journalists and the Gerald R. Ford of Public Policy, as part of the university’s continuing series: “Democracy in Crisis: Views from the Press.” 

Award-winning journalist, author, and podcaster, Kara Swisher has interviewed nearly every consequential innovator and tech entrepreneur working today. Her new memoir, Burn Book: A Tech Love Story, is an insider’s tale of success, failure, hubris, and optimism. As the electric vehicle revolution becomes a predominate topic in this country, Swisher sits down with Mary Barra, Chair and CEO of General Motors, to discuss her new book and explore the dynamic interplay of legacy companies, innovation, strategic bets on the future and tech’s potential to solve problems and not just create them. 

Burn Book by Kara Swisher

Book Description:

From award-winning journalist Kara Swisher comes a witty, scathing, but fair accounting of the tech industry and its founders who wanted to change the world but broke it instead.

Part memoir, part history, Burn Book is a necessary chronicle of tech’s most powerful players. From “the queen of all media” (Walt Mossberg, Wall Street Journal), this is the inside story we’ve all been waiting for about modern Silicon Valley and the biggest boom in wealth creation in the history of the world.

About Wallace House:

Wallace House Center for Journalists at the University of Michigan is committed to fostering excellence in journalism. It is home to programs that recognize, sustain and elevate the careers of journalists to address the challenges of journalism today, foster civic engagement and uphold the role of a free press in a democratic society. It believes in the fundamental mission of journalism to document, interpret, analyze and investigate the forces shaping society.

Guest Biographies:

Mary Barra - Headshot

Kara Swisher is the host of the podcast, “On with Kara Swisher,” and the cohost of the “Pivot” podcast with Scott Galloway, both distributed by New York magazine. She was the co-founder and editor-at-large of Recode, host of the “Recode Decode” podcast and co-executive producer of the Code conference. She was a former contributing opinion writer for The New York Times and host of its “Sway” podcast and has also worked for The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. “Burn Book: A Tech Love Story” is her third book.

Kara Swisher - Headshot

Mary Barra is Chair and Chief Executive Officer of General Motors. Under Barra’s leadership, GM envisions a world with zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion. Prior to becoming CEO, Barra served as GM executive vice president, Global Product Development, Purchasing and Supply Chain, and as senior vice president, Global Product Development. In these roles, Barra and her teams were responsible for the design, engineering and quality of GM vehicle launches worldwide.

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