Media
Rebecca of Ivanhoe
Great review of Rebecca of Ivanhoe in The Jerusalem Report:
https://alison-bass.com/the-jerusalem-report-reivew-of-rebecca-of-ivanhoe/
Essay I wrote in The Forward about possible connection between Ivanhoe’s Rebecca and real-life philanthropist and educator Rebecca Gratz:
https://forward.com/culture/674233/rebecca-of-ivanhoe-rebecca-gratz-walter-scott-alison-bass/
Rebecca of Ivanhoe featured in the Advance Copy column of NASW magazine:
https://www.nasw.org/member_article/alison-bass-rebecca-ivanhoe
Rebecca of Ivanhoe featured in Brandeis magazine’s On the Bookshelf column:
https://www.brandeis.edu/magazine/2025/winter/sections/bookshelf.html?
Brassy Broad
West Virginia Living magazine gives Brassy Broad a thumb’s up
The Morgantown edition of West Virginia Living magazine lauds the “vivid story telling” and “no-holds-barred accounts” in my memoir, Brassy Broad: How one journalist helped pave the way to #MeToo.
A New Memoir on Discrimination, Ethics, and Empathy in the World of Journalism
The Daily Athenaeum, West Virginia University’s student newspaper
Former WVU professor to give presentation about her reporting that helped lead to #MeToo
Author’s Corner: In Conversation with Alison Bass and Catherine Fitzpatrick
Two award-winning journalists (Catherine Fitzpatrick and myself) are interviewed by Elizabeth Gibson about what it was like to be a female investigative journalist in a male-dominated industry. View here.
Virtual conversation with the Brandeis Women’s Network
Amy Cohen, co-chair of the Brandeis Women’s Network, interviews me on Zoom about my memoir, Brassy Broad, and my career. The event was cosponsored by the Brandeis Women’s Network and the Women’s Studies Research Center. View here.
Brassy Broad featured on Advance Copy
This short essay on NASW’s Advance Copy talks about how I became one of the first journalists to write about sexual misconduct by powerful men and why I wrote my memoir, Brassy Broad.
Brassy Broad: How one journalist helped pave the way to #MeToo
Interview with the New York Science Writers
Alison Bass interview with Meg Hodgkin Lippert
In this video, I interview Meg Hodgkin Lippert, the daughter of one of Bryn Gweled’s founders, about the unusual intentional community that we both grew up in. Meg is an accomplished “brassy broad’ in her own right, having authored many award-winning children’s books.
Shaping Opinion Podcast
This podcast tells the story of how I became the first reporter to break the priest abuse scandal for The Boston Globe and the tensions that erupted in the Globe newsroom as a result:
Breaking the Story: Boston Priest Abuse Scandal
Getting Screwed
The Los Angeles Review of Books
The Los Angeles Review of Books lauds Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law for its “comprehensive reporting and storytelling.”
Bass opinion piece in the Los Angeles Times
In her op-ed piece, Alison Bass argues that shutting down advertising outlets for sex workers only makes life more dangerous for them:
Sex Work is Safer Online than on the Street
C-Span
Book Discussion on Getting Screwed
Alison Bass talked about her book Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law, in which she weaves the true stories of sex workers with the latest research on prostitution. Professor Bass argued that current laws hurt sex workers, clients, and society at large and said that it was time for prostitution to be decriminalized. View here.
The Round Table
I was invited to participate in this online round table conversation in 2018 about the pros and cons of legalization prostitution
Brandeis University Press
Publishers Weekly
Review: “She makes a strong case for broad decriminalization with limited regulation while assessing the effectiveness of other solutions in place, including brothel-only legalization in Nevada, the temporary loopholes in Rhode Island law, the criminalization of clients in Sweden and Germany, and Canadian laws that prohibited communication about prostitution but not the act itself. The book provides a solid overview of the legal ramifications of sex work, and builds compassion for those at the heart of the issue.”
WBUR’s The Artery
The Artery, WBUR radio’s arts and culture site interviewed Alison Bass about her new book, Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law
Alison Bass Challenges Common Conceptions Of Sex Work In ‘Getting Screwed’
The Dallas Morning News
The Dallas Morning News published a Q&A with Alison Bass about her new book, Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law
Getting Screwed Author Alison Bass on the business of sex
The American Scholar
An excerpt from Getting Screwed in The American Scholar
Getting Screwed; Read an excerpt from Alison Bass’s new book on sex workers and the law
Playboy magazine
Playboy interviewed Alison Bass about the negative impact of anti-prostitution and trafficking laws on sex workers
Sex Workers Suffer the Unintended Consequences of Trafficking Laws
U92/WWVU-FM
U92 interviewed Alison Bass about her new book, Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law
Community Feedback: “Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law”
The Charleston Gazette-Mail
The Charleston Gazette-Mail interviewed Alison Bass for article on prostitution in Cabell County, West Virginia
Cabell County tries new approach to prostitution: public shaming
Television Interview with Natasha Sherman
An exploration of how U.S. anti-prostitution laws harm the public health and safety of sex workers and other citizens and why sex work is vilified in our culture. View here.
West Virginia University Reading and Discussion
Taping of Alison Bass’ book launch at West Virginia University
The Dominion Post
In this series on prostitution and trafficking, Alison Bass says that most adult sex workers in the United States are selling sex by choice, largely for economic reasons. She also argues that criminal laws against prostitution are not helping anyone, sex workers or actual trafficking victims. Research shows that decriminalizing adult prostitution would lead to less violence against all women and lower rates of sexually transmitted diseases, she says.
There’s a difference between human trafficking and willing prostitution
WVU Prof: Criminalizing prostitution not helping anybody
Huffington Post
Rentboy Raid Latest Salvo in Government’s Counterproductive War on Sex This week, federal and state law enforcement officials shut down the well-known website, Rentboy.com, which provided a venue for thousands of gay escorts to post ads and screen potential clients. In a raid on the site’s headquarters in New York City, the officers arrested seven of the site’s employees, including its CEO, and charged them with selling sex and laundering money. Continue reading
The Dallas Morning News
Q&A: ‘Getting Screwed’ author Alison Bass on the business of sex You are remarkably non-judgmental in the book. Was that the product of an evolution of your attitude, in an effort to set biases aside? Or did you go into this project thinking, “This is something that should probably be decriminalized?” I didn’t go into this thinking that it should be decriminalized. I didn’t know much about sex work until I met my first sex worker and I was really blown away by how intelligent and articulate she was. She came from a middle-class Orthodox Jewish background, and she was doing sex work so she would have time to do her true passion, which was volunteering on behalf of disenfranchised people. She worked with the homeless, she worked with prisoners, and she worked with people with mental illness. By doing sex work, she could work 10 hours a week instead of 40 hours a week and spend the rest of her time doing what she cared most about. Read full interview
Salon
A double standard in enforcing prostitution laws: “It’s economically advantageous to have [high-end sex work] going on” D.C. police routinely arrest streetwalkers & raid massage parlors, while leaving high-end independent escorts alone.
KERA Radio, “Think”
The Case for Legalized Prostitution
How We Talk About Sex
Interview with celebrated actor and host Eric Leviton
Listen to the Podcast now
National Association of Science Writers
Alison Bass, Getting Screwed:Sex Workers and The Law
Auntie Bellum magazine
Auntie Bellum magazine, which bills itself as an “honest, unapologetic voice for southern women,” lauds Getting Screwed: Sex Workers and the Law as a “comprehensive and reader-friendly book” that features “careful and thorough research from a wide variety of sources.”
Side Effects
Articles
- April 29, 2012
The Scandal Behind the Secret Service Scandal
The Boston Globe - August 2, 2010
A public home-care insurance cushion
The Boston Globe - July 2, 2010
Searching for Signs of Spain’s Jewish Past
The Jewish Advocate - Spring 2009
Blogs, Watchdog Reporting, and Scientific Malfeasance
Nieman Reports - September 8, 2008
Keeping the Window into Drug Firms’ Practices Open
The Boston Globe - June 2, 2008
A Dose of Honesty in Prescription Drug Ads
The Boston Globe
- January 21, 2008
An Underinsured Kick In The Groin
The Boston Globe - September 24, 2007
Suicide Rates as a Public Relations Tool
The Boston Globe - March 15, 2003
CIGNA’s Self-Inflicted Wounds
CIO Magazine - July 22, 2001
The Price of Success
The Boston Globe Magazine - February 21, 2000
Lest He Forget
The Boston Globe