Combining practical 'how to' skills with reflection on the place of each specialism in the industry, this guide features the skills needed to cover specialist areas, including writing match reports for sport, reviewing the arts, and dealing with complex information for science. The book will also discuss how specialist journalists have contributed to the mainstream news agenda, as well as analysing how different issues have been covered in each specialism, such as the credit crunch, global warming, national crime statistics and the celebrity culture in sport. Areas covered include: Sport Business Politics Crime Environment Fashion Food Music Media Science Health Law Travel War Wine
The Routledge Handbook of Environmental Journalism provides a thorough understanding of environmental journalism around the world. An increasing number of media platforms – from newspapers and television to Internet social media networks – are the major providers of indispensable information about the natural world and environmental risk. Despite the dramatic changes in the news industry that have tended to reduce the number of full-time newspaper reporters, environmental journalists remain key to bringing stories to light across the globe. With contributions from around the world broken down into five key regions – the United States of America, Europe and Russia, Asia and Australia, Africa and the Middle East, and South America – this book provides support for today’s environment reporters, the providers of essential news in the 21st century. As a scholarly and journalistic work written by academics and the environmental reporters themselves, this volume is an essential text for students and scholars of environmental communication, journalism, and global environmental issues more generally, as well as professionals working in this vital area.
Journalism and Free Speech brings together for the first time an historical and theoretical exploration of journalism and its relationship with the idea of free speech. Though freedom of the press is widely regarded as an essential ingredient to democratic societies, the relationship between the idea of freedom of speech and the practice of press freedom is one that is generally taken for granted. Censorship, in general terms is an anathema. This book explores the philosophical and historical development of free speech and critically examines the ways in which it relates to freedom of the press in practice. The main contention of the book is that the actualisation of press freedom should be seen as encompassing modes of censorship which place pressure upon the principled connection between journalism and freedom of speech. Topics covered include: The Philosophy of Free Speech Journalism and Free Speech Press Freedom and the Democratic Imperative New Media and the Global Public Sphere Regulating Journalism Privacy and Defamation National Security and Insecurity Ownership News, Language Culture and Censorship This book introduces students to a wide range of issues centred around freedom of speech, press freedom and censorship, providing an accessible text for courses on journalism and mass media.
Science Journalism: An Introduction gives wide-ranging guidance on producing journalistic content about different areas of scientific research. It provides a step-by-step guide to mastering the practical skills necessary for covering scientific stories and explaining the business behind the industry. Martin W. Angler, an experienced science and technology journalist, covers the main stages involved in getting an article written and published; from choosing an idea, structuring your pitch, researching and interviewing, to writing effectively for magazines, newspapers and online publications. There are chapters dedicated to investigative reporting, handling scientific data and explaining scientific practice and research findings to a non-specialist audience. Coverage in the chapters is supported by reading lists, review questions and practical exercises. The book also includes extensive interviews with established science journalists, scholars and scientists that provide tips on building a career in science journalism, address what makes a good reporter and discuss the current issues they face professionally. The book concludes by laying out the numerous available routes into science journalism, such as relevant writing programs, fellowships, awards and successful online science magazines. For students of journalism and professional journalists at all levels, this book offers an invaluable overview of contemporary science journalism with an emphasis on professional journalistic practice and success in the digital age.
The concept of boundaries has become a central theme in the study of journalism. In recent years, the decline of legacy news organizations and the rise of new interactive media tools have thrust such questions as "what is journalism" and "who is a journalist" into the limelight. Struggles over journalism are often struggles over boundaries. These symbolic contests for control over definition also mark a material struggle over resources. In short: boundaries have consequences. Yet there is a lack of conceptual cohesiveness in what scholars mean by the term "boundaries" or in how we should think about specific boundaries of journalism. This book addresses boundaries head-on by bringing together a global array of authors asking similar questions about boundaries and journalism from a diverse range of perspectives, methodologies, and theoretical backgrounds. Boundaries of Journalism assembles the most current research on this topic in one place, thus providing a touchstone for future research within communication, media and journalism studies on journalism and its boundaries.
Cross-Border Collaborative Journalism is a detailed guide to transnational reporting, a cutting-edge journalistic strategy. In the twenty-first century, the most pressing political and social issues, such as financial crises, wealth inequality, migration flows and environmental collapse, transcend national borders. In reaction, journalists are increasingly collaborating across the globe to produce impactful and in-depth reporting. Recent agenda-setting cross-border collaborations include LuxLeaks, Panama Papers and Football Leaks. Brigitte Alfter takes the reader, step-by-step, through the history of cross-border collaborative journalism and the current working practices behind it. The book draws from the author’s own experience, as well as exclusive interviews with other pioneers of cross-border journalism, and notable case studies are integrated throughout. Chapters cover: Managing intercultural communication Effectively utilising a network of sources Choosing the initial story idea Fact-checking for cross-border publication Adapting the findings to different audiences and to different types of media Legal and security considerations for a cross-border team. By providing the essential practical skills for transnational reporting, Cross-Border Collaborative Journalism encourages students of journalism and practitioners to undertake their own collaborative projects. It highlights the importance of this exciting new journalistic form to answering the defining questions of our time.
In the face of the continuously changing challenges of the digital age, it is difficult for quality news journalism to survive on any significant scale if a means for adequately funding it is not available. This new study, a follow-up to 2007’s The Future of Journalism in the Advanced Democracies, includes a comparative analysis of possible alternative business models that may save the future of the quality news business across the developed, intermediate, and developing worlds. Its detailed evaluation encompasses also the different ways in which wider key issues are affecting the prospects for quality news as a core ingredient of effectively working democracies. It focuses on the United States, the United Kingdom, South Africa, India, Kenya, and selected parts of the Arab World, providing a comprehensive cross-cultural survey of different approaches to addressing these various issues. To keep the study firmly rooted in the "real world" the contributors include distinguished practitioners as well as experienced academics.
"If you want a book that instructs you about all the technical skills you need to pass the examinations set by the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) and embark on a career in journalism, then this is the book for you. It outlines the basic knowledge required to succeed as a trainee reporter. Shorthand, intros, writing styles, subbing, layout, the way newsrooms work and how to find things out are among the range of skills described." - Times Higher Education "Precisely what it says on the cover - a down-to-earth essential handbook for anyone embarking on a career in journalism. All you need to know about avoiding newsroom minefields and attracting the editor′s attention for the right reasons. If only it had been around in my day!′ - Bob Satchwell, Executive Director, Society of Editors This is a book for everyone who wants to be a journalist: a practical guide to all you need to know, learn and do to succeed as a trainee reporter in today′s newsroom. Although the world of journalism is changing fast, as technology blurs the boundaries between newspapers, radio, television and web-based media, the reporter′s core role remains the same: to recognise news, communicate with people, gather information, and create accurate, balanced and readable stories. Essential Reporting, written by an experienced NCTJ examiner, explains how to do this. Contents include: what makes a good reporter what is news, and how to find it how newsrooms work day-to-day life as a reporter key reporting tasks covering courts and councils successful interviewing writing news stories specialist reporting handling sound, pictures and the web It also contains a wealth of advice, tips and warnings from working journalists, a guide to NCTJ training and examinations, a glossary and a guide to further reading. It will be invaluable to anyone embarking on a career in journalism and is the NCTJ′s recommended introductory text for all students on college and university courses preparing them to become successful reporters.
Radio and television news are expanding everywhere, often at the expense of print media. Developments in global communications, in theory at least, have made the world smaller. An event anywhere can theoretically be reported anywhere else on radio within minutes; on television within hours. But theory and practice are often far apart. Broadcast News has become a global business, almost like the music industry, with its own 'Top 10' and an inevitable streamlining of taste. A few major organisations control the newsflow. Syndicators guarantee that more and more of us get to see or hear the same stories. This is typified by the growth of independent or local news stations, and cable suppliers, competing mercilessly with the traditional giants of the news airwaves (the US Networks, the BBC and other Public Service Broadcasters, etc.). But does this development satisfy the democratic demands of enlightened society and of informed citizens? This book presents a catalogue of worries, but also some rays of hope. It looks in detail at news broadcasters on both sides of the Atlantic. It also covers the international broadcasting scene as well as third world countries and recent developments in Glasnost's USSR. A major empirical study of what we get from broadcast news (taking the case of the USA, Britain and Sweden) is also presented. Models useful for understanding both the present and the future are suggested.
This is a critical examination of the impact of sustained large-scale austerity cuts on local government communications in the UK. Budget constraints have left public sector media teams without the resources for robust citizen-facing communications. The "nose for news" has been downgraded and local journalists, once the champions of public interest coverage, are a force much diminished. The book asks, what is lost to local democracy as a result? And what does it mean when no one is holding the country’s public spenders to account? The authors present extensive interviews with communications professionals working across different council authorities. These offer important insights into the challenges currently being faced by communicators within local public services. The book also includes in-depth case studies on the Grenfell Tower disaster, the Rotherham child-grooming scandal and the Sheffield tree-felling controversy. These events all raise serious questions about the scrutiny and accountability of local authorities and the important role the media can and does play. Local Democracy, Journalism and Public Relations provides new empirical data on, and the real-world views of, working communications teams in local government today. For students and researchers interested in local journalism and public relations, the book illuminates the current relationship between these professions, local democracy and political accountability.
