The Hardest-Working Paper in America | 
Monday, May 6, 2024
Portrait of Rummana Hussain cropped below the chest. Rummana wears a white top with floral appliques. She has long, dark hair and is looking toward the camera.

Rummana Hussain

Editorial board member and columnist

Rummana Hussain joined the editorial board in 2021 and is a popular columnist who writes on a variety of social and cultural topics. Hussain has held several jobs at the Sun-Times, including assistant metro editor, criminal courts reporter, general assignment reporter and assistant to columnist Michael Sneed. Before joining the Sun-Times, Hussain covered education and criminal courts in Lake County for the Chicago Tribune and covered crime, education and City Hall for the now-defunct City News Bureau. A Chicago native, Hussain was named a Jefferson journalism fellow by the East-West Center in 2006. She has served on the board of the Chicago Headline Club and the local chapter of the Asian American Journalists Association. She has a masters degree in journalism from Northwestern University and a bachelor’s degree from Loyola University. She lives in Rogers Park.

A portrait of Mahsa Amini is held during a rally calling for regime change in Iran following the death of Amini, a young woman who died after being arrested in Tehran by Iran’s notorious “morality police,” in Washington, Saturday, Oct. 1, 2022.
Columnists
Protests in Iran are a reminder: Stop policing what women want — or don’t want — to wear
Since Mahsa Amini’s violent death, protests have broken out against the Islamic Republic’s regime and its mandatory hijab laws. On the flip side, Muslim women elsewhere have been and are fighting for their right to cover their hair.
By Rummana Hussain
 
A displaced boy who fled his flood-hit home carries food rations as he wades through a flooded area on the outskirts of Peshawar, Pakistan, Sunday, Aug. 28, 2022. Officials in Pakistan say deaths from widespread flooding have topped 1,000 since mid-June. Flash flooding from the heavy rains has washed away villages and crops as soldiers and rescue workers evacuated stranded residents to the safety of relief camps and provided food to thousands of displaced Pakistanis.
Columnists
Flood-hit Pakistan deserves more attention and help
The crippling natural disaster is another example of how the actions of economically stronger and more powerful nations, however unintentional, can have a crushing impact.
By Rummana Hussain
 
Pigeon Rocks, also known as the Rock of Raouché, in Beirut.
Columnists
Chicago isn’t a ‘hellhole.’ Neither are many other places dismissed as ‘dangerous.’
Many places around the world are deemed dangerous. Violence does exist in these locales. But as in Chicago, there’s more to the story, and if a living hell exists for some residents here or elsewhere, it’s because someone is stoking the fire.
By Rummana Hussain
 
The author’s work station in her Rogers Park condo.
Columnists
I’ve warmed up to working remotely, but still miss the old-school newsroom
I didn’t think I had it in me. Turns out, I do. I have gotten used to working from home. Yet, I still yearn to be working in a fully operational newsroom again where my colleagues and I can collaborate and gossip face to face.
By Rummana Hussain
 
A bulldozer is being used to demolish the residence of Javed Ahmed, a local leader who was allegedly involved in the recent violent protests against Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) former spokeswoman Nupur Sharma’s incendiary remarks about Prophet Mohammed, in Allahabad on June 12, 2022. (Photo by SANJAY KANOJIA/AFP via Getty Images)
Columnists
India is miles away but its tyranny is shaking, shaping American politics
American supporters of the BJP and its affiliated ultra right-wing, paramilitary organization Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh manage to steamroll anyone who calls out India’s abysmal treatment of Muslims, oppressed castes and other minorities.
By Rummana Hussain
 
This handout file picture obtained from a former colleague of Al-Jazeera’s late veteran TV journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, shows her reporting from Jerusalem on June 12, 2021. Abu Akleh, 51, a prominent figure in the channel’s Arabic news service was shot dead by Israeli troops early on May 11, 2022 as she covered a raid on Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, according to the Qatar-based network.
Columnists
Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was shot to death by Israeli forces, colleagues and witnesses said. Then the spin started.
The Al Jazeera’s correspondent’s shooting death barely made the local news last week.
By Rummana Hussain
 
Best documentary feature winners for “Summer of Soul” (L-R) Joseph Patel, Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, David Dinerstein and Robert Fyvolent pose in the press room during the 94th Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, California on March 27, 2022.
Columnists
Chris Rock’s ‘other’ Oscar slap
Rock described the “Summer of Soul’s” creative team as Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson and “four white guys.” One of those “guys,” Joseph Patel, is South Asian.
By Rummana Hussain
 
Michelle Wu smiles during a standing ovation after she was sworn-in as Boston Mayor during a ceremony at Boston City Hall, Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2021, in Boston. The election of Wu marked the first time that Boston voters elected a woman, or a person of color, to lead the city. Before Wu, Boston had only elected white men as mayor.
Commentary
When prominent women of color are misidentified, it’s a reminder: We don’t all look alike
A South Asian woman orbiting the same spaces as me always guarantees one thing: We will be confused for each other.
By Rummana Hussain
 
Sen. Barbara Blackmon, D-Canton, speaks at the well in the Senate Chamber at the Mississippi State Capitol in Jackson, Miss., Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022. Blackmon was among the Black lawmakers who walked out of the Senate Chamber in protest Friday, Jan. 21, 2022, and withheld their votes as the body passed a bill that would ban schools from teaching critical race theory.
Columnists
People of color live through discomfort. White kids will survive learning the truth about racism.
I didn’t know it then, but an incident during my sophomore year of high school encapsulates how many of us have had to douse our indignation and grievances, especially on matters of race, for the sake of white comfort.
By Rummana Hussain