Lauren Walsh teaches at NYU, where she is the Founding Director of the Gallatin Photojournalism Intensive. She is also the Managing Director of Journalist Safety Initiatives with the James W. Foley Legacy Foundation.
Additionally, Walsh is Director of the national photography archive Lost Rolls America. A Fulbright Specialist in Photography and Ethics, Walsh focuses on conflict photography, ethics, and mental health in journalism.
Walsh’s newest book is Through the Lens: The Pandemic and Black Lives Matter (2022). Her other books include Conversations on Conflict Photography (2019) and Shadow of Memory (2021, co-author); and she is co-editor of The Future of Text and Image: Collected Essays on Literary and Visual Conjunctures (2012) and The Millennium Villages Project (2016), and editor of Macondo: Memories of the Colombian Conflict (2017). She has published widely in mainstream and academic journals, and appeared as a photography expert on CNN, BBC, and Al Jazeera. Walsh serves on the boards of leading photojournalism organizations.
Walsh has led global workshops on media literacy, journalist safety, and trauma-informed reportage; conducted the first nationwide study on media worker mental health in an active war zone (Ukraine); and is co-leading the first-ever initiative on psychological wellbeing for Arab world photographers. She served as judge for the 2025 Pulitzer Prizes and is a frequent public speaker, including at a NATO summit and the 2025 keynote for World Press Photo. She has been honored with NYU’s Excellence in Teaching Award, and holds a PhD from Columbia University.