Howard French

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Howard French

Birth name	Howard Waring French
Born	1957
Circumstances
Occupation	journalist, author, photographer, former university instructor
Spouse	Agnes French
Notable credit(s)	The New York Times; A Continent for the Taking (book)
Official website

Howard Waring French (born 1957) is a New York Times senior reporter as well as an author and photographer. French taught at a university in the Ivory Coast in the 1980s before becoming a reporter. He has reported extensively on the political affairs of Western and Central Africa. These reports were the basis for the book A Continent for the Taking.

French has also reported on the political and social affairs in China, where he reported on the government crackdown of dissent in the Dongzhou protests of 2005. Most of his current work for The New York Times is centered on China.

French was New York Times bureau chief for the Caribbean and Central America from 1990 to 1994, covering Haiti, Cuba, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and numerous other countries.

From 1994 to 1998, French covered West and Central Africa for the Times, reporting on wars in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Central Africa, with particular attention to the fall of the longtime dictator of Zaire, Mobutu Sese Seko.

French became Tokyo bureau chief for the Times in 1999, after a year studying Japanese at the University of Hawaii in Manoa. He is presently a senior writer for the Times, and has served as Shanghai bureau chief since 2003.

In addition to covering China as Shanghai Bureau Chief for the Times, French is a weekly columnist on regional affairs for The International Herald Tribune.

French is an internationally exhibited photographer, whose multi-year project, photographing the rapidly shrinking old quarters of Shanghai, "Disappearing Shanghai" has shown in Asia, Europe and the United States.