Liz Balmaseda, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for commentary, writes from the heart of Miami, her home. She is a sonorous, often polemic voice of her generation, the Cuban-American children of exiles. For 20 years, she has chronicled the city's dramatic evolution in the poignant and passionate stories of its immigrants, providing a genuine view into a community that is routinely trivialized and caricaturized. Her writings on identity have redefined the lexicon for her roots-seeking generation, fusing echoes of old Havana with the fresh expressions of urban Miami. In a debate often dominated by militants, academics and politicians, she often takes a pop culturist's view, seeking universal links and common ground. Her columns in The Miami Herald trace the political, social and cultural arteries that run through the city's multicultural heart. From its start, the column broke open an exile debate once controlled by hardliners and cast a revealing light on the silenced, politically diverse masses. She was born in Puerto Padre, Cuba, 17 days after Fidel Castro's revolution of 1959. Her parents, Eduardo Balmaseda and Ada Mas, brought her to Miami when she was just 10 months old. Raised in Hialeah, the most Cuban city in America, she grew up shifting gears between cultures. The daughter of a salesman and a seamstress, she grew up in a tight-knit family as the oldest of three children. She joined The Miami Herald as an intern during the spring of 1980, when racial riots tore through the city and 125,000 refugees from Port Mariel, Cuba, landed on South Florida shores. Hired in 1981, she worked at the paper's Spanish-language publication, El Herald, then moved on to the city desk as a general assignment reporter. In 1984, she won second place in the Scripps-Howard Foundation's Ernie Pyle Award for Writing Excellence. The following year, she became the Central America bureau chief for Newsweek magazine, based in El Salvador and reporting throughout the war-torn region. Later, she went to work for NBC News as a Honduras-based field producer, covering the Nicaraguan contra war. She returned to The Herald in November 1987 as a feature writer. Later she joined the staff at the paper's Sunday magazine, Tropic. In 1989, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists awarded her first prize for print in the Guillermo Martinez-Marquez contest, for her magazine story on second-generation Cuban-Americans. That cover story put Miami's "YUCAs" -- the Young Upward Cuban Americans -- on the map, and ushered in the nuevo cubano trend that still rages. In her most recent assignment, in the fall of 1991, she became a local columnist. In 1992, after six months on the job, she was selected as one of three finalists for the Pulitzer Prize, for her columns on Cuban-Americans in Miami. In 1993, she won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary for columns on Cuban-American issues and a series out of Haiti during the repressive de facto regime that ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. For her commentaries on Haiti, she has been honored by the National Association of Black Journalists, as by the National Association of Hispanic Journalists. She was awarded first prize in commentary by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors in 1993 and 1994. She also received the "Las Primeras" award from the Mexican American Women's National Association. In July 1994, she was awarded the prestigious Ruben Salazar award by the National Council of La Raza. In 1996, she was honored by the American Cancer Society as one of Miami's Most Dynamic Women. For her columns on human rights, she was honored by Amnesty International. She also has been recognized for her writings about people living with AIDS. In 1998, Miami's community coalition for Women's History honored her as a pioneer in her profession. Last year, she was honored by the Cuban American National Council in Washington D.C. as the nation's most notable young Cuban American. And this year she shared her second Pulitzer Prize with Herald colleagues for coverage of the raid against Elian Gonzalez. She lectures nationally and has appeared on Oprah, NBC Today, Good Morning America, Nightline, National Public Radio and the BBC's Radio Four. She has also appeared in various documentaries about the Cuban exile experience, including Mari Rodriguez Ichaso's "Marcadas por el Paraiso," and the nationally aired "Cafe con Leche." She co-produced the film "American Purgatory," shot by hidden camera inside the Guantanamo refugee camps. Her radio essays have been aired by NPR's All Things Considered, Latino U.S.A. and the BBC's Radio Four, for which she wrote and hosted a critically acclaimed documentary on Miami's ethnic relations. The BBC has called her "an expressive writer who is known for being unafraid of controversy." She was featured in the book, "Mothers and Daughters," along with her mother, Ada, and her sister, Elaine. Knopf published her work in two anthologies of Latino writings, titled "Las Christmas" and "Las Mamis." She is featured in a Ford Foundation-funded collection of writings by Cuban women, and she is a contributor to national magazines. Last year, she served as an associate producer and writer for HBO's film on jazz trumpeter Arturo Sandoval, "For Love or Country," starring Andy Garcia. She recently co-authored her first book, "Waking Up in America," the memoir of homeless advocate Dr. Pedro Jose Greer Jr., published by Simon & Schuster in September 1999 and released this year in paperback. She is writing a film for HBO based on that book. She is also producing a documentary on terrorism and freedom of speech in Miami. Her column appears in The Miami Herald Mondays and Thursdays. Her commitment to Miami extends beyond her work as a journalist. She is co-chair for Miami's Comic Relief benefit, which raises funds for the Camillus Health Concern homeless clinic in Overtown, one of the city's poorest neighborhoods. She also serves on the advisory board of the Gloria Estefan Foundation, a humanitarian organization launched by the world-famous singer. This year, the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery acquired a portrait of her painted by Miami artist Carlos Betancourt. She lives in Miami Beach, Florida.