Davar Ardalan

Her full name, Iran Davar Ardalan, inspired the 2004 NPR/American Radioworks series, “My Name is Iran.” In the stories she explored the country for which she was named, tracing her Iranian heritage and her own experiences after the 1979 Islamic revolution. The struggle of a nation as reflected in her family’s story led to a memoir to be published by Henry Holt in January 2007.

In April of 2002, Ardalan and NPR’s Jacki Lyden received a Gracie award from the American Women in Radio and Television for the NPR documentary “Loss and Its Aftermath,” the story of Israeli and Palestinian parents speaking about the deaths of their children in the conflict.

Ardalan’s career in the American media began in 1991 at KOAT-TV in Albuquerque, N.M., A year later, she made the switch to radio as a reporter at KUNM-FM in Albuquerque. She produced award-winning cultural and news stories on health and environmental concerns in Los Alamos for which she won first place in documentaries from the Associated Press in New Mexico.

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Davar Ardalan at NPR

Davar Ardalan is a Supervisory Producer for Morning Edition, making many of the creative decisions that shape the changing daily broadcast. Some of those decisions must be made in an instant, during a live broadcast. Other decisions require elaborate coordination and planning - such as shaping Morning Edition broadcasts from Baghdad, New Orleans, and the Vatican.

Ardalan began as a temporary production assistant in July 1993 and a year later she moved to a full-time production assistant position at Weekend Edition Sunday. After spending nearly twelve years as a field producer, teaming with NPR hosts and correspondents to report on topics including girls in New York gangs, gambling in Atlantic City casinos, and Islam in cyberspace, Ardalan transitioned to Morning Edition in January 2005. Over her time at NPR, Ardalan’s profiles have included the actor Paul Newman, San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, and the World Wrestling Federation’s “Mankind.”

Ardalan earned a B.A. in communications and journalism from the University of New Mexico. She was born in San Francisco and has also lived and worked in Iran as a television newscaster. Ardalan attended elementary and middle school at Iranzamin International School in Tehran and graduated from Brookline High School in Brookline, M.A. Away from NPR, she is the mother of four.