Our interns keep us going at Sojourners. This is not just idle praise; it is gospel truth. Along with doing essential (but sometimes less-than-stimulating) jobs, they help shape our work with their experience, skills, insights, questions, and challenges.
For the editorial assistant intern, one of the more time-consuming and tiring tasks is transcribing interviews for the magazine. We've been interviewing a lot of people lately, and our current editorial assistant, Jesse Holcomb, has spent many hours typing and listening, listening and typing. So perhaps he was especially poised to jump on a chance to do some of the talking for once. Culture Watch editor Molly Marsh sent out an e-mail to the rest of the editorial staff, letting us know that she was arranging a last-minute interview with singer-songwriter Bruce Cockburn, who was just back from a trip to Iraq. Jesse was at her door "momentarily." A second-generation fan, Jesse literally grew up with Cockburn's music. When Molly offered him the chance to do the interview, Jesse did not hesitate. The excellent fruit of his efforts is found on page 38.
And yes, Jesse transcribed his own interview.
OUR FRIEND AND consultant Henry Freeman was in a bookstore paging through The Best Christian Writing 2004 anthology and was pleased and surprised to find that two staff-written Sojourners articles (by executive editor David Batstone and associate editor Julie Polter) were included. So take it from Henry-next time you're in your local bookstore, look for us (in the company of other fine writers and journals) in The Best Christian Writing 2004.
-The Editors
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