Emma Cott

Lecturer

Alumni

Emma Cott is a journalist and documentary filmmaker who has produced work across the United States, and in Latin America and South Asia.

She spent a decade as a video journalist on staff with The New York Times, where she reported and produced visual journalism across a broad coverage range, from an investigation of a rising leader in the far right, to an explainer of the way Pfizer makes its Covid-19 vaccine. Her work at the Times won numerous awards, including two Picture of the Year Awards (POYi) for a series on the future of robotics, a Human Rights Press Award for a video about India’s crackdown on Muslim citizens, and a Front Page Award for an investigation into misleading advertising by a chain of anti-abortion centers.

Before joining the NYT, Emma worked in documentary film in the Bay Area and New York City. She spent nearly a year embedded in the emergency department of Oakland’s public hospital for the Oscar-shortlisted documentary, The Waiting Room. She has also worked on several films for PBS, including a digital project about women trailblazers called MAKERS: Women Who Make America, and Frontline’s The Suicide Plan, an Emmy-nominated exploration of the underground world of assisted suicide.

Emma has a B.A. in History with a concentration in Latin American Studies from Oberlin College, and an M.J. from the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism’s documentary track. In 2019 she co-taught J282, Introduction to Video Journalism, and is delighted to return to the J-School to work with second-year students this fall.

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