WOMEN ON WAR: Battlefield Correspondents from Vietnam to Afghanistan
The Georgetown Journalism Program presents
WOMEN ON WAR: Battlefield Correspondents from Vietnam to Afghanistan
Half a century ago, war reporting was almost exclusively a male profession, and many news organizations refused to send women to combat zones. In Vietnam, former Associated Press correspondent Peter Arnett wrote, “The prevailing view was that the war was being fought by men against men, and women had no place there.” But the Indochina wars became something of a turning point as pathbreaking women pushed against those barriers and produced great journalism. In the decades since, news organizations have assigned dozens of women to cover combat, and their presence in the battlezone is no longer treated as a curiosity (at least, it shouldn’t be). How did those barriers come down? What barriers remain? How have women correspondents changed the way we cover – and think about – war?
Panelists:
Elizabeth Becker, former Washington Post correspondent in Cambodia, former New York Times Pentagon correspondent, author of YOU DON’T BELONG HERE: How Three Women Rewrote the Story of War
Jessica Donati, Wall Street Journal correspondent in Afghanistan, author of EAGLE DOWN: The Last Special Forces Fighting The Forever War
Sylvia Poggioli, NPR Senior European Correspondent who reported on Bosnia in the 1990s, winner of Georgetown’s Weintal Prize for Diplomatic Reporting
Moderator: Deborah Amos, NPR international correspondent who covered both the 1991 Gulf War and 2003 Iraq War, Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton