By Brandon Fey, Staff Writer
On Monday, Oct. 16, the student organization Things Ukrainian at Gettysburg (TUG) hosted a conference with the editor-in-chief of the media platform Ukraïner Anastasiia Marushevska. This took place from 8 to 9:30 p.m. in Room 103 of Glatfelter Hall.
Marushevska, zooming in from her temporary residence in Indonesia, began the seminar by describing the mission of Ukraïner. She said the platform is focused on researching Ukraine and its context so that they can share the nation’s stories with audiences at home and around the world.
Since its founding in 2016, Ukraïner has reported on a variety of topics including Ukrainian history, culture, art and the national economy among other things. As of Feb. 2022, it has devoted a great deal of focus to covering the Russian invasion of the country.
Ukraïner is currently available in twelve different languages to reach a global audience. In addition to its core team, it has over 700 volunteers who serve as journalists and translators around the world. The media platform is a non-profit organization that prides itself on independent journalism that is completely free of advertisements.
“We work with grants, we work with donations, and it helps us to create content that we want to create without thinking that we need to think about how to build ads on top of it,” Marushevka said.
She then described some of the projects Ukraïner has worked on, including an awareness campaign about Ukraine’s indigenous population and national minorities, which she said ought to be referred to as “national communities.” These include Hungarians, Slovaks, Crimean Tatars and Krymchaks, who have had a historic presence in Ukraine for centuries. Most of these communities have no homeland despite being native to the region. The platform has also documented their histories and cultures in an effort to protect their communities.
Ukraïner has provided extensive coverage of the Russian occupation of Ukraine, from perspectives both within and outside the country. Much of this work has focused on the human perspective and documenting stories of civilians in liberated villages, including those who were deported or killed. Marushevka went into depth on the immense hardships facing civilians in occupied areas, including torture, deportation and loss of identity.
The platform also has a more military-focused series about the individual Ukrainian units that are currently fighting. Speaking on Ukraine’s military tradition, Marushevka said, “We focus a lot on the resilience of Ukrainians and how they have resisted occupiers.”
Judging from her personal experience, Marushevska believes that many media platforms have failed to provide adequate coverage of Russia’s forced deportations of Ukrainians. She has seen a lack of stories from the important perspectives of adults as a result of the world media’s preference for dramatic, child-focused narratives.
Marushevska concluded her presentation by emphasizing the importance of understanding the context of news and information to form accurate ideas. She encouraged the audience to study the background of Russia and Ukraine for a greater understanding of the conflict. She told them to reach out to her via LinkedIn with any further questions about her work.
President and founder of TUG Maria Kardash ’26 commented on the situation in Ukraine and the importance of this event.
“It isn’t just a personal issue for myself because this war is no longer just a Ukrainian issue, but a global issue. It’s really important to understand these historical events that are happening right now in our present,” Kardash said. “Even though this seems like it’s very war-focused, in order to understand this war, we also have to focus on a lot of the cultural, religious and historical aspects that have continued throughout Ukrainian and Russian history to understand it, so it’s always fantastic to see people show up and support Ukraine.”
