Bill Sonnega - St. Olaf College
Thirlby Co. Leader to Learn From: November 2023
November 8, 2023
Dr. William (“Bill”) Sonnega is a professor of Film, Media and Theater at St. Olaf College, where he is founder and has served as long-time director of the Media Studies program. As a teacher, Dr. Sonnega’s courses survey a wide range of topics in the media landscape, including the relationship of media to race, mental health, politics and the environment.
As a college professor, Bill strives to facilitate open and inclusive conversations in the classroom, with one goal of “enlightened and healthy skepticism about the forms of media [students] use, consume, create, and share,” said Bill.
However, Bill is candid about the rise of anxiety felt by both students and professors in classrooms. “Many students are hesitant or afraid to talk in class,” shared Bill. “For a wide variety of reasons, they are anxious about being subject to real or imagined cancellation. They are reticent like students have never been reticent.”
Read on to learn more about Bill’s decision to become a college professor, the rise of TikTok, and why he believes that leadership is about helping others toward self leadership across their lives.
OUR INTERVIEW WITH BILL
Tell us about your path to becoming a college professor!
How much time do you have? You’re talking to a college professor [laughs].
I had an inkling my freshman year of college that this is what I wanted to do, and I grew up in a home that highly valued education. I told myself there was no way I’d be ready for this for quite some time. I didn’t begin work on my doctorate until I turned 30. Instead of going straight into education, I saw my twenties as a period in which I should have a wide variety of experiences that would inform my work as a professor later. I had to give myself permission to go on that journey while all of my peers were plugging into various positions.
For those of our readers who are less familiar, can you tell us about the academic field of media studies, and why it’s important today?
Media Studies is a relative newcomer to higher education - it gained momentum in the late 20th century and continues to today. Post World War II, developed societies went through a time where they were profoundly transformed through television. Radio was still the dominant media of the day for delivering news and events, but by the late 1950s, almost 98 percent of American households had at least one TV, whereas at the beginning of the decade almost no one had a TV.
Media Studies as an academic subject grew up in response to this, as new communication technologies began to develop faster than we could keep up with them. Studying the ways that media is produced and consumed, and its effects on things like identity, agency and community, has become an important way that higher ed has remained current. The field is doing well.
What is your hope for your students by the time they go through their Media Studies degree?
That they have developed a kind of enlightened and healthy skepticism about the forms of media that they use, consume, create, and share. Second, that guided by their values, they are able to act upon that skepticism. That they are able to distinguish in their own terms the benefits and liabilities of media use at home, with friends, and at work.
One topic that has become front and center in recent years - and even right now - is media literacy. College students are consuming a lot of media and boldly proclaiming their viewpoints on social media and on college campuses. Where and how are college students consuming their information?
TikTok. They are for the most part done with Facebook. Email is just used for institutional purposes, and Instagram can help you curate your best life. To lean into this, and to encourage students to develop a bigger and more complicated picture, in some of my classes I’ve mandated that students read from multiple and competing news sources for a 14-week semester - it’s a new experience for many in a polarized media environment.
In this environment, some of the most egregious and polarizing claims naturally generate the highest levels of engagement, and hateful voices are amplified. As these voices are monetized, they become a valuable form of currency, which makes it very difficult to regulate them. The study of polarization is obviously more complicated than this, but one takeaway is that we may be leaving the notion of mass media behind in favor of highly personalized media experiences. Cat videos, for instance, remain some of the most popular media content globally, and cat videos are not too polarizing. That gives me hope!
What is the hardest part about being a college professor?
In terms of what’s going on today, many students are hesitant or afraid to talk in class. For a wide variety of reasons, they are anxious about being subject to real or imagined cancellation. They are anxious about being branded or disallowed the opportunity to have questions or multiple and competing views, or nuanced views. They are reticent like students have never been reticent.
This didn’t happen overnight and of course it’s not solely related to college students. Many of my colleagues are as anxious as the students are. What if you’re on a tenure-track appointment as a new professor? Ideally, you want to be able to facilitate difficult conversations, but no one seems to want to offer the first word.
At the same time, it’s arguably more important than ever to talk about current events in class, and this is a big change in college culture. I think where many teachers get into trouble is - you have to have a lot of humility to know when you’re not the expert.
Switching gears to our seven leadership questions - how would you define confidence?
The ability to tell yourself that you have the ability to do something, and then to do it with unwavering clarity, no matter the outcome. The latter is the important part for me. I see it as analogous to trust and it accrues over time. I also think that people have more of it than they think they do.
How would you define your mission or purpose in life?
My mission is to be as fully present for this life as I can - for all the people in my life, and for everything I think and feel. I want to be distracted as little as possible. Whether it’s having a good conversation, making dinner, feeling grief, or experiencing joy - I want to think it all and feel it all. If I can do this, then I can trust that outcomes will be good. But the key is that I have to extend that to others. Listen to their stories without judgment. And offer my own stories without judgment.
What is your greatest superpower as a leader?
I’m a consensus builder. I’m 40 years into a directing career, in which I like to sit not at the top but in the middle of a large team and be the conduit through which creativity, compassion, and information flows. My greatest curiosity in this sense is really just about people, and the ways leadership can help them work together.
Tell us about a time that you failed as a leader. What did you learn from your experience?
Early on in an administrative role, I became aware of some colleagues' behavior that I thought was counterproductive. I convened a meeting and told them that what they were doing was counterproductive to our students - our stakeholders. During this meeting, I told the colleagues that “this has to stop right now.” That didn’t go well. I came on righteously and too strong. I made the problem worse and then I prolonged it. That began a learning curve that led me to a place of humility and consensus-building.
What is something that might surprise people about you?
I have not only very liberal but very conservative friends.
What advice would you have for someone who is feeling stuck right now in their life or career?
What I would do is help someone analyze their resources and assets, including but not limited to their financial life - in other words, if you’re going to leave this position without anything lined up, what are the real material lifestyle implications for you? Let’s quantify it. And then create a space (for example, six months), in which something new can happen. It can reduce our anxiety to have a timeline.
One thing I’ve done with students is create an ABC plan. Plan A is taking their degree to the marketplace in search of a job. Plan B is further education, such as graduate school. And Plan C is something outside the box that they’ve always dreamed of but never thought they might do - like renting a place with friends, getting a restaurant job and a ski pass in a resort community.
What is one piece of advice you would give to your younger self?
Take the deal! If you’ve been working hard and an opportunity comes along, and there is a trusted senior mentor that is offering it to you, and what they are offering is to help launch you in some way - take the deal.
Anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
Leadership is about helping others toward self leadership across their lives. I recently got feedback that my leadership had been about helping people lead themselves. It made me think about my mentors and what they were passing onto me.
About Bill (He/Him)
Dr. William Sonnega is a professor of Film, Media and Theater at St. Olaf College, where he is founder and has served as long-time director of the Media Studies program. As a teacher, Dr. Sonnega’s courses survey a wide range of topics in the media landscape, including the relationship of media to race, mental health, politics and the environment. He is currently teaching a seminar on Media, Democracy and the Global Village, which considers prospects for democracies in the world today in view of social media, algorithms, disinformation and big data.
As a writer and director, Dr. Sonnega also teaches courses on documentary production. In 2022, while leading the Global Semester, he produced Worth the Fight, a film about challenges to democracy shot on location in Ecuador, Jordan and Czech Republic, featuring interviews with academics, politicians, religious leaders, artists, activists and others. This year, Worth the Fight was honored at St. Olaf with a Cassling Innovation Award.
As a scholar, Dr. Sonnega’s recent research focuses on building cognitive endurance in distracted college classrooms, and how the ability to sustain effortful mental activity for a continuous period of time is an important form of human capital. Relatedly, his research has investigated the relationship of media multitasking to academic performance, and to digital pedagogies that enhance teaching and learning.
Dr. Sonnega holds a Ph.D. in Theater and Performance from the University of Minnesota, where his research focused on the relationship of live to mediated performance. He also holds an M.F.A. in Dramatic Writing from New York University, and an B.A. in Fine Arts from Colorado College.
When not in the classroom or leading college projects, Dr. Sonnega enjoys long beach and woods walks with his wife and dog, skiing in the mountains, and cooking and eating global cuisines.
About This Feature
Leaders to Learn From is a standing feature in The Thirlby Company’s monthly newsletter that recognizes outstanding leaders in our community who embody our company’s core values. You can learn about our other honorees here, or subscribe to our newsletter to receive this feature and more inspiring content in the future.
