Dialogue: Grotto Nights at the Library

From online news to longform reporting, journalists continue to speak truth to power, even as algorithms control our feeds and authoritarian regimes cut funding. 

Join the conversation with Brandy Collins, Lauren Markham, and Nate Olivarez-Giles as they discuss the future of journalism in a world of memes and misinformation. Moderated by Janine Kovac

Bios:

Brandy Collins is a writer and public services advocate, born and raised in the Bay Area. She is a 2019-2020 cohort graduate from the Maynard Institute for Journalism, a correspondent for Oakland Voices, a blogger, and the funny one in numerous group chats. She is concerned with civic engagement and leadership development toward making public works more efficient for the people. Brandy is full of Scorpio magic and a self-proclaimed Professional Aunty. Follow her on Twitter @MsBrandyCollins or Instagram @story_soul_collecter.

Lauren Markham is a writer based in California whose work regularly appears in outlets such as Harper's, The New York Review of Books, The New York Times Magazine and VQR, where she is a contributing editor. She is the author of the award-winning The Far Away Brothers: Two Young Migrants and the Making of an American Life, the California Book Award and Dayton Literary Peace Prize shortlisted A Map of Future Ruins: On Borders and Belonging (2024) and Immemorial (2025). She edits The Approach, a renegade newspaper offering approaches to navigating, thwarting, and resisting autocracy.

Nate Olivarez-Giles (he/him) is a fiction writer exploring themes of love, grief, class, race, masculinity, sexuality, technology, climate change, and chicano life in the future. Over the last two decades, Nate has worked in journalism and technology, at the Arizona Daily Star, Los Angeles Times, Wired, The Verge, The Wall Street Journal, TWiT, and Apple Inc. Born in Los Angeles and raised in Phoenix and Tempe, he graduated from the University of Arizona with a double-major in Journalism and Mexican American Studies. Nate was a James Reston Fellow at The New York Times in 2008 and a 3rd Space by Roots Wounds Words Fiction Fellow in 2024.

Janine Kovac (she/hers) writes about power dynamics and women's bodies. She is the author of Brain Changer: A Mother's Guide to Cognitive Science, Spinning: Choreography for Coming Home and the memoir The Nutcracker Chronicles. Janine is the recipient of the Calderwood Fellowship for Journalism from MacDowell and U.C. Berkeley's Glushko Prize for distinguished research in cognitive science. 

The Writers Grotto is a community of working writers and narrative artists who connect in physical and virtual space, pooling their talents to support each other, mentor and teach others, and engage the wider world. The Grotto fosters a literary culture that is generous in spirit and deeply inclusive, elevating writers of all backgrounds. 

Connect: The Writers Grotto - Website | The Writers Grotto - Instagram | The Writers Grotto - Facebook