Practicing journalism is dangerous. Until the wars in Ukraine and Gaza broke out, Mexico continued to rank as the deadliest locale for reporters, with too many other countries close behind, including Afghanistan, Syria, India, and the Philippines. More journalists have been killed in Gaza since October 2023 than during the entirety of World War II and the numbers of journalists killed, injured, or exiled from both Russia and Ukraine since the Russian invasion in 2021 continues to grow.
The University of Oregon staged the “Extra! Extra! Refugee Journalists become the Story—Migrating to Stay Alive” conference in April 2024 with expert guest speakers: refugee journalists, academic experts, and others who specialize in exiled journalist issues and threats to journalists and free expression.
The symposium brought Mexican refugee journalists in exile to the University of Oregon campus for keynote speeches followed by workshops with other experts in the fields of freedom of expression and threats to journalists. These workshops led to student field work during the conference dates, work regarding how the crises examined during the conference impact tools used by immigrants to obtain news from their countries of origin.
The material generated during the symposium plus ancillary reportage fuels the critical stories and conclusions told in the book Don’t Shoot the Journalists.

Journalist Peter Laufer is the James Wallace Chair Professor of Journalism at the University of Oregon.