Author and oral historian reflects on journey from campus paper to the journalism faculty
Lyndsie Bourgon, BJHons ’08, has run the gauntlet from humanities student and scrambling campus paper editor to more recent runs as a King’s writing coach and Master of Journalism adviser. Now Bourgon, a distinguished journalist, author and oral historian, can add King’s professor to her c.v. after the School of Journalism, Writing & Publishing hired her onto the faculty.
Prof. Bourgon’s path to academia has been a winding road. She worked as a freelance writer and magazine editor upon graduation, living for a time in Scotland, Toronto, Haida Gwaii, B.C. and her home province of Alberta. She has also gathered Indigenous people’s stories as an oral historian in Canada and Peru. We caught up with Prof. Bourgon in her office as she began her first semester by teaching journalism research to advanced and graduate students.
What’s the backstory of your journey into journalism?
I grew up in a very, very small town that had a population of about 800. And I really liked to write as a teenager in southern Alberta. I would spend a lot of my time reading, watching the news. I really liked nonfiction, and my family was like, ‘you should look into journalism,’ which I started to do. And for university (journalism) degrees at that time, there were really only four or maybe five schools, and King’s was one of them.
How did things go overall for you at King’s?
I loved that first-year journalism course, Intro to Journalism. Loved my tutor, who I still keep in touch with, Lezlie Lowe. Then going into second year, that’s when I started getting really into it.
In third year, I was the editor of The Watch (campus magazine). I would stay until midnight when the security guard left and I’d be, ‘see you tomorrow’ because I was working all day and then I’d work on the paper. We changed it into the format that it is now, where it’s magazine size, and we knew that we wanted to make it a news magazine à la Maclean’s, as opposed to sort of marketing it with the term ‘newspaper.’ I have a lot of memories of trying to recruit writers. I was looking through (back issues) the other day because I was looking for a picture I wanted to use. And, I was like, oh, ‘this is not half bad.’
What role did The Watch experience play in your decision to become a journalist?
I always knew that I wasn’t necessarily wanting to go into a daily newsroom. I liked the flow of a monthly publication. And it definitely solidified for me the style of writing that I wanted to do. Investigative, somewhat longform. I was doing interviews, but they were pretty deep, longform interviews. And I had a lot of research. The Watch and King’s both gave me that for sure. (Journalism Professor) Stephen Kimber was super encouraging to me and saying, ‘it seems like you like to do these news features and you’re pretty good at them.’
Tell us how that desire to do longform investigative stories marked your career.
I used the skills that I had learned (at King’s) in a different way. I could work on deadline. I could copy edit, I was curious, I could talk to people. I also got experience in different fields, which was really good. I started working in cultural heritage and history and oral history. And within that I’ve been very lucky to learn about how policy recommendations are made, how laws are enacted on the ground. With that came a lot of new experiences in Indigenous communities and band council relations. It really changed how I see our country and the stories in it. And that’s a blessing.
In what way has oral history helped your journalism?
My particular interest is about how those policies that are made in Ottawa or in capital cities actually look in real life. I think that oral history in particular is very open about relationships of power. So, I was very interested in that. Oral historians are often responding to moments in time that have been dominated by the perspectives of government, politicians, people in power. And balancing that with people outside those halls, working-class people, people who might not even work, people with different perspectives and experiences. That’s something that journalists do all the time, but then sometimes we miss an opportunity to really broaden our coverage in that way.
How does all this translate to your teaching?
I felt that I often had common ground with some of my students, because I had seen so much of Canada, and I’d had interesting experiences that I could often meet them where they were at. I want to challenge my students, and encourage them, and make them strive for their own personal best. I think I have to meet them where they’re at and think about their priorities.
The King’s student is now a King’s professor. How do you feel about that?
Well, it feels amazing. I feel very lucky that the faculty has welcomed me back because there were people on my hiring committee who taught me and who I respect deeply. It meant a lot for me that they were there and that they were able to learn a bit more about what I’ve done with the skills that they taught me. I feel just incredibly lucky to be back in this atmosphere, to be meeting the King’s students, who I still have a lot in common with (laughs). Just today I had my door open, and I could hear someone talking about their (Foundation Year Program) paper. Oh, I just love that! It’s their first paper; it’s so nerve wracking. And I feel a lot of connection to that.
What’s your best advice for students?
Read, read, read your books. That’s what I tell all my students, all the time, constantly. That’s how I get all my ideas is through reading and drawing connections that I’ve made through reading newspapers, reading magazines, reading books. That’s what King’s taught me. I think that’s something that makes King’s very unique, is their intellectual-meets-practical atmosphere in the journalism program.
