On Jan. 30, members of the Walla Walla community and Whitman College students funneled into the Maxey Auditorium for a talk delivered by New York Times journalist M. Gessen. A Russian-American war reporter, Gessen has published pieces on the war in Ukraine and genocide in Gaza. The second event in a year-long series titled The Press in Times of Peril, the talk focused on adjusting to — and questioning— a ‘new normal’ in the United States’ ever-changing political landscape. The previous event for the series included a roundtable discussion with two professors of journalism. Nicole Simek, Professor of Indigeneity, Race and Ethnicity Studies and Gender Studies, organized the series and saw Gessen’s talk as a crucial way to engage with international politics. 

“The global studies program has historically offered a lot of different kinds of programming. From lectures and workshops to reading groups and seminars,” Simek said. “So… this year we were interested in putting on some sustained programming around topics that we felt were particularly urgent.” 

As the director of the Center for Global Studies, Simek hopes that events like these will help students consider social issues through a global lens. 

“We were really interested to provide some opportunities for people to think through the global life of the press, the kind of connections between intricate local contexts and broader global structures that influence how we think about the rise of autocracy, or the repression of journalism, or self-censorship,” Simek said. 

For Simek, the series is a way for students and community members to broaden their understanding of international media and embrace knowledge from career experts. When planning the event, Gessen’s name first came up as a possible keynote speaker from suggestions by college faculty. Julia Ireland, Chair of German Studies and Professor of Philosophy, suggested Gessen because she teaches their work in class. 

“Gessen, because they started as a Soviet Journalist and because of how much they’ve seen, is this access point to comparative history in ways that really matter,” Ireland said. “Gessen is a reader of Hannah Arendt, Arendt wrote a book on Totalitarianism. So for me there’s an intellectual affinity.”

Ireland was ecstatic to see Gessen on campus, and she views the series as essential for student education outside of the classroom. For her, Gessen’s talk not only provided a space to learn about global perspectives, but it also offered attendees an opportunity to recognize important speakers. 

“What was remarkable for me was, if you looked at the audience, the number of community members outnumbered the number of faculty and the number of students. And I think it is fabulous and I think it is unfortunate,” Ireland said. “I think it’s unfortunate that Whitman students failed to understand the kind of caliber of an intellectual person that Gessen is.” 

Mairi Session, a sophomore who attended Gessen’s talk, explained how talks like these benefit Whitman students when they attend. Session first became interested in the event because of emails sent out to the campus community, and she decided to attend because she saw the talk as an answer to her own questions about the global political climate.

“I love talks that don’t feel like they’re in a super academic setting and that are different from my classes, that are like mini-lessons on current events. I love keeping up with politics and looking at our current political climate through media and through censorship,” Session said. 

Session was drawn to the talk by the opportunity to learn, and she stayed for Gessen’s expertise. 

“I think that [Gessen’s] comparison with the Soviet Union and Russian regimes and media control was super interesting and will be valuable to us because ours [media] is [also] in peril, potentially,” Session said. 

Although she enjoyed the speaker’s unique perspective, Session emphasized the importance of student attendance in order to grow into knowledgeable members of any community. Like Ireland, Session views the series as a way for young people to engage with world events.

“I think almost anything about current events is relevant for students because we’re about to be, well, we do live in and we’re about to be part of [a] community in a much more in-depth way than we are right now,” Session said. 

Whether in attendance for a new angle on American politics, to listen to an expert journalist, or to discuss global perspectives, those sitting in the audience last Thursday pondered Simek’s opening question: What does it mean to live in perilous times?