Is Peace in our Future?

By Alyssa Maine 

Wenham, MA- 

Our world is one that deals with the tension between violence and peace daily. The newspapers are littered with stories of war and pop culture and our world has become a place where all too often we can see these two tensions side by side. The 28th International Day of Peace was held at Gordon on September 21^st and it celebrated the creation of the Peace and Conflict Transformation minor.

Junior history major, Joanna Gallagher attended both Daniel Steele’s talk during Chapel and the Peace Minor celebration. After studying in Israel and Jordan during the summer, Gallagher had been challenge don her own view of peace. Having the peace major will allow students to explore how they view peace and conflict outside of the United States.
 

“I hope that we (students) are brave enough to embrace the challenge of becoming peace-builders,” Gallagher said,  “not pushing this work to the remote future or watering it down, but rather practicing it right now in the dorms and dining hall in all its complexity and difficulty.” 

Good Night and Good Luck

Journalism movies are not hard to come by. Watching How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days or Shattered Glass is intriguing and holds some sort of allure to it. Journalism becomes romantic.  But the reason I like Good Night and Good Luck, directed by George Clooney, is because it depicts the field of media in in its ethical dilemma. 

“Our history will be what we make it. And if there are any historians about fifty or a hundred years from now, and there should be preserved the kinescopes for one week of all three networks, they will there find recorded in black and white, and in color, evidence of decadence, escapism and insulation from the realities of the world in which we live. We are currently wealthy, fat, comfortable and complacent. We have currently a built-in allergy to unpleasant or disturbing information. Our mass media reflect this. But unless we get up off our fat surpluses and recognize that television in the main is being used to distract, delude, amuse and insulate us, then television and those who finance it, those who look at it and those who work at it, may see a totally different picture too late.” 

Often times as a Communication Arts major I have found myself struggling with the tension between observing mass media and fixing mass media. What is my role as a student of communication? Where do am I able to know the flaws that exist and the solutions to those problems?

The film asks these questions, if not broadly, specifically. Television has the ability to portray a reality that may or may not exist. My role is to be ethical in how that reality is portrayed. 


More importantly, Good Night and Good Luck forces the audience to grapple with what is portrayed and how it is portrayed. Whether the reality concerns Joseph McCarthy or Barack Obama the media is the watchdog and should be held to a greater standard. 

From Performing Arts to Liberal Arts

By Alyssa Maine

Wenham, MA— Dancer. Actor. Musician. At a performing arts school is the student just their performance or are they more than their art? When Matt Slipp decided to come to Gordon after three semesters at Juilliard he was searching to be considered something more than just his ability to sing opera.

Slipp, freshman Music and Psychology Major from Gorham, Maine spent a year and a half in New York only to realize that he desired to be more than just a voice. At Juilliard the mindset is to become nothing else, just a product and performer.

The philosophy for learning is drastically different at Gordon College. The mission is “to graduate men and women distinguished by intellectual maturity and Christian character, committed to lives of service and prepared for leadership worldwide.” The liberal arts education promises more than just a craft, rather a holistic and integrated view of oneself.

“I am not just a musician. I am a musician as well as a Christian,” Slipp said. “I am a whole human being and I get to experience that here at Gordon.”

Slipp has been blessed to have already made close friends since one of his best friends from Gorham goes to Gordon as well. The workload is greater, but Slipp is learning from his new education.

Jodi Hassett Sanchez: SOLD

"By telling their stories can we inspire others?"Jodi Hassett Sanchez poses this question on her website.  In her film, Sold: Fighting the New Global Slavery I was challenged to consider the perspectives that I approach a story from. Sanchez sheds light on some of the worst forms of slavery that exist today, in the hopes of inspiring others to become aware and make changes that can prevent inhumane actions from occurring. She dares journalists to look at what stories they are writing. Sanchez holds true to the old Elements of Journalism adage, "give a voice to the voiceless."

Classic Book on Writing Remains Relevant for Modern Writers

Wenham, MA- Words count. Whether that medium is a text message, email or newspaper article, today’s words need to be concise, clutter free, and bold.

William Zinsser in his book, On Writing Well not only teaches relevant writing skills, but along the way offers encouragement and support for anyone who writes poorly, perfectly or anywhere in between. “Writing is hard work,” he says, “A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first time, or even the third time. Remember this in moments of despair. If you find that writing is hard, it’s because it is hard,”

Journalist Christian Brink, 21, says “One thing I remember from my high school English class is that every word must earn its way onto the page and that is just what Zinsser gets at in his chapter on simplicity. I feel that young writers too often try to impress their audience with verbose language, which often clouds their original intent.”

Zinsser’s book, written over 30 years ago, still has value to today’s aspiring writers. “For me, Zinsser has awakened my eyes to what journalists should truly see. By no means are his tools obsolete for the modern day journalist. Above all, Zinsser’s points will make the work of today’s journalists more enjoyable and fulfilling” Stuart Knechtle, 22 says.

The writer has reason to persevere. “But all of them are vulnerable and all of them are tense. They are driven by a compulsion to put some part of themselves on paper, and yet they don’t just write what comes naturally,” Zinsser says, “They sit down to commit and act of literature, and the self who emerges on paper is far stiffer that the person who sat down tow rite. The problem is to find the real man or woman behind the tension.”

Gordon Community Informed by Variety of News Sources

By Alyssa Maine

Wenham, MA- When Gordon student Joanna Gallagher, 20, wakes up in the morning and opens her laptop she wants to know what is going on globally. “BBC seems to highlight more international events that we should know about,” she says. Other news sources don’t always inform on what is occurring outside of America and for her a global awareness is important.

Students involved in the Gordon College Student Association (GCSA) on campus, Paulo Valaci, 21, and Jesse Adams, 21, get their news from The Wall Street Journal. Representative at Large, Tony Hoveln, 27, is a weekly Time Magazine reader following stories on the elections and most recently the oil spill at the Gulf.

Laurie Truschel, Director of Student ministries at Gordon College, stays informed of local happenings through the Salem News. Truschel can often be found getting her news, “on the go!” The radio has become her on the go source tuning into BBC and NPR.

Likewise, Barry Loy, Vice President for Student Development and Dean of Students, is drawn to the convenience of aggregate websites like yahoo.com and msn.com because its easy use. While he used to buy print journalism, he has made the switch to online news in order to save a little.

The Gordon Community reads their news in hopes of being more informed, and while there is not just one way to get that news, the community is seeking to know what is going on in the world.