Week 3: The characteristics and role of journalism

8/10/2019 Week 3: The characteristics and role of journalism

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COMM-125 Introduction to Journalism

Section 1- Language of instruction English

Wednesdays 15:00-18:00

Venue: NEWTON Amphitheatre

Lecture no. 3

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From the time of the earliest known

journalistic product,

a news sheet circulated in ancient

Rome called

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the Ac ta Diurna,

published daily from 59 BCE,

hung in prominent places of the city to

record important social and politicalevents

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the earliest newspapers printed using

wooden plates in China

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the world's first newspaper, published

in Germany in 1605

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the first American and Cypriot

newspapers,

printed in 1690 and 1878 respectively,

as we saw during our previous

meeting,

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journalism aims at providing

citizens a free flow of information.

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Any suppression of this flow, known as

the suppression of the freedom of the

written speech,

results in censorship, as we also saw

during the previous lecture.

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However, is that only what journalism is

for? To initiate and fulfill the free flow of

info in any form?

Are there any educational, professional

and ethical requirements, to becoming ajournalist?

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Journalism: Art or Science?

There are educational requirements to

becoming a journalist, otherwise you

wouldn't be in this class!

There are also scientific requirements to

becoming a journalist, one who knowsthe technology (machines, software

etc.)

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BUT, since the journalistic profession is

not yet officially safeguarded (like

medicine, architecture, law etc.),

people from other disciplines, like the

ones mentioned, can also becomejournalists.

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Journalism as an art

To connect this with education, in

journalism, having scientific degrees

and diplomas only, is not enough.

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Because, becoming a journalist entails

a considerable percentage ofattribution and talent, complimenting

our knowledge.

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Journalism: a profession or not? or

more?

Of course journalism is a job and

journalists do need to feed their kids,

or pay of loans and mortgages,

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but being a journalist is not like working

in any other profession.

For example is not like just producing a

commodity or product to sell in the

marketplace.

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Journalists, though the free flow of

information,

inform society about itself and make

public that which otherwise be private.

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Hence journalism is also a liturgy,

offering a public service or a service to

society,

like the service offered by the teachers,

or the clergymen.

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Thus journalism is rather an important

job, you might thing,

with a distinct role in society,

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For instance, the feeling among

journalists that they are working for the

public good,

not just for their private benefit and self

interest, as most other professions.

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This 'social responsibility' theory,

puts the journalists into a normative

framework,

which states that they should be driven

to benefit the public!

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In journalism there are both

professional and ethical standards.

Today we are going to deal basically

with the professional ones, although

the two are difficult to be separated.

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For example, because journalism's first

loyalty is to the citizenry,

journalists are obliged to tell the truth.

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This is definitely the highest

professional code. However if

journalists lie,

then we have an unethical dimension,

violating the ethical standards andundermining professionalism,

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Irrespective of the fact that these

standards are in most of the casesprescriptive, (telling what ought to be

done).

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According to our course outline

however, we will discuss the ethical, or

unethical dimension of journalismseparately, in the last week (no. 13).

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Back to the role of journalism in

society, which dates back in the 1920s,

as modern journalism was just takingform,

with the well known Walter Lippmannvs. John Dewey public debate.

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In the 1920s American philosophers

Walter Lippmann and John Dewey

engaged in an ongoing debate aboutthe role of journalists.

The debate never really ended.

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What they both agreed on was that

journalists play a vital role in a

(democratic) society.

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Where they disagreed was how that

role should be played.

They argued about whether the press

should be leaders or teachers of the

citizenry

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Lippmann viewed modern society as

too complex for the average citizen to

make informed choices.

In his view, trained experts were

needed to make decisions and explain

those decisions to the citizenry. A

paternalistic approach!

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Dewey argued that democracy

required the active participation of

citizens.

According to him it was the job of

journalists and the government to

figure out how to engage the entire

public in the decisions that would affect

them all in the end.

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At the heart of this debate is whether or

not journalists should really be viewed

by themselves or by society asprofessionals.

Lippmann would argue they should.Dewey provides a caution.

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Unlike other professions such as law,

medicine or accounting any standard

of journalistic competency

must be centered on practice rather

than theory.

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For this reason calling a journalist a

professional

would require a peculiar taxonomy to

define a profession.

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Furthermore, putting journalists to the

realm of professionals is undesirable

because it implies limitations that

diminish the important role they play in

society.

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The 10 "commandments" of journalism,

according to the Pew Research Center

Journalism Project

1. Journalisms first obligation is to

the truth

Democracy depends on citizens havingreliable, accurate facts put in a

meaningful context.

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Hence, the first and primary duty of

journalists today, as per the majority of

professional codes globally, is

the seeking and reporting of the whole

truth. Is this feasible or utopian?

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On this issue, there is absolute

unanimity and also utter confusion:

Everyone agrees journalists must tell

the truth. Yet people are confused

about what thetruthmeans

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This desire that information be truthful

is elemental.

Since news is the material that people

use to learn and think about the world

beyond themselves, the most importantquality is that it be useable and reliable

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Truth, it seems, is too complicated for

us to pursue.

Or perhaps it doesnt exist, since we

are all subjective individuals.

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There are interesting and valid

arguments

on some philosophical (religious) level

about truth

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but journalism does not pursue truth in

an absolute or philosophical sense.

Journalism canand mustpursue it in

a practical sense.

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This journalistictruthis a process that

begins with the professional discipline

of assembling and verifying facts.

Then journalists try to convey a fair and

reliable account of their meaning, validfor now, subject to further investigation.

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Journalists should be as transparent

as possibleabout sources (*in week 5

we will discuss the right to protectconfidentiality of sources)

and methods, so audiences can maketheir own assessment of the

information.

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Even in a world of expanding voices

and media saturation,

accuracyis the foundation upon which

everything else is built:

context, interpretation, comment,criticism, analysis and debate.

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The truth, over time, emerges from this

forum. As citizens encounter an ever

greater flow of data,

they have more neednot lessfor

identifiable sources dedicated toverifying that information and putting it

in context.

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Similarly in academia, when preparing

an academic/scientific work/paper

identifiable sources for verifying

information are a must!

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According to Badiou,

a complete truth is a fiction because atruth is never complete, it never

finishes: there is something infinite in

truth.

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In other words, truth has manyaspects, faces, or sides.

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From this you can understand that truth

is not single, one, singular, whole,complete or absolute.

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Hence the well-known verdicts,

ournations truth, their propagandaor our freedom fighters and heroes,

their terrorists or suicide killers and

vice versa.

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Similarly, we have other kinds of

bipolar, or dilemmatic truths, such as:

the sex/gender truths (men vs. women,feminism vs. phallocrat approaches),

the black/negro versus white truth andso on.

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There are also many and differing

theories of and on truth.

The five major ones are the following:correspondence, coherence,

constructivist, consensus and

pragmatic. Each theory presents

perspectives that are widely shared.

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Of the 5 major substantive theories on

truth mentioned, the Correspondence

Theory best explains the truth of

applied journalism (or journalistictruth),

since out of it sprang the idea of

"objective reality" representation.

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Thus, essential/objective truth in

journalism, essentially means that

journalists

do not always promise to tell the truth,

the whole truth and nothing but the

truth.

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Since, as we explained, this is

practically impossible.

This is understandable and acceptable.

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If however they choose/decide not to

portray even the objectivereality/truth,

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either by withholding information and

facts they have, or

by fabricating or altering them and

consciously lie, then this is both

unprofessional and unethical.

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So what does a journalists obligation

to the truth mean?

Journalists themselves have never

been very clear about what they mean

by truthfulness.

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This is one reason why the discussion

of objectivity is problematic as well and

has become such a trap!

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In reality journalism attempts to get at

the truth in a confused world by

stripping information first of anyattached misinformation, disinformation

(half-truth), or self-promoting

information and then letting the

community react.

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2. Journalisms first loyalty is to

citizens

While news organizations answer to

many constituencies, including

advertisers and shareholders,

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the journalists in those organizations

must maintain allegiance to citizens

and the larger public interest aboveany other

if they are to provide the news without

fear or favor.

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This commitment to citizens first is the

basis of a news organizations

credibility,

the implied covenant that tells the

audience the coverage is not one-

sided for friends or advertisers.

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Commitment to citizens also means

journalism should present a

representative picture of all constituentgroups in society.

Ignoring certain citizens or groups, has

the effect of disenfranchising them.

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3. Journalisms essence is a

discipline of verification

Journalists rely on a professional

discipline for verifying information.

When the concept of objectivity

originally evolved, it did not imply that

journalists are free of bias.

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It called, rather, for a consistent

method of testing informationa

transparent approach to evidenceprecisely

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so that personal and cultural biases

would not undermine the accuracy of

their work.

The method is objective, not the

journalist.

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Seeking out multiple witnesses,

disclosing as much as possible aboutsources,

or asking various sides for comment,all signal such standards.

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This discipline of verification is what

separates journalism from other modes

of communication,

such as propaganda, fiction or

entertainment.

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But while journalism has developed

various techniques for determining

facts, for instance,

it has done less to develop a system

for testing the reliability of

journalistic interpretation.

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4. The practitioners of journalism

must maintain an independence

from those they cover

Independence is an underlying

requirement of journalism, a

cornerstone of its reliability.

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Independence of spirit and mind, rather

than neutrality, is the principle

journalists must keep in focus.

We will discuss the struggling with

your inner self when writing!

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While editorialists and commentators

are not neutral, the source of their

credibility is still their accuracy,

intellectual fairness and ability to

informnot their devotion to a certain

group, cause or outcome.

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5. Journalism must serve as an

independent monitor of power

Journalism has an unusual capacity to

serve as watchdog over those whose

power and position most affect citizens.

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This is recognized to be a barricade

against despotism.

As journalists, we have an obligation to

protect this watchdog freedom by not

downgrading it in frivolous use or

exploiting it for commercial or personal

gain.

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6. Journalism must provide a forum

for public criticism and compromise

The news media are the common

carriers of public discussion. This

discussion serves society best when it

is informed by facts rather than

prejudice and supposition.

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It also should strive to fairly represent

the varied viewpoints and interests in

society,

and to place them in context rather

than highlight only the conflicting

fringes of debate.

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Accuracy and truthfulness require that

as framers of the public discussion

we do not neglect the points of

common ground where problem

solving occurs.

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7. Journalism must strive to make

the significant interesting and

relevant

Journalism is storytelling with a

purpose. It should do more than gather

an audience or catalogue the

important.

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For its own survival, it must balance

what readers know they want with whatthey cannot anticipate but need.

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This means journalists must continually

ask what information has most value tocitizens and in what form.

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Journalism is a form of cartography

and recording: it creates a map forcitizens to navigate society.

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Inflating events for sensation,

neglecting others, stereotyping orbeing disproportionately negative, all

make a less reliable map/record.

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8. Journalism must keep the news

comprehensive and proportional

Keeping news in proportion and not

leaving important things out are also

cornerstones of truthfulness.

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The map also should include news of

all our communities, not just those with

attractive demographics.

Majoritarian and minority ones,

mainstream and alternative.

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This is best achieved by unbiased

newsrooms, with a diversity ofbackgrounds and perspectives.

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must be allowed to exercise their

personal conscience in thenewsroom

Every journalist must have a personal

sense of ethics and responsibilitya

moral compass.

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Each of us must be willing, if fairness

and accuracy require, to voice

differences with our colleagues,whether in the newsroom or the

executive suite.

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News organizations do well to nurture

this independence by encouragingindividuals to speak their minds.

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This stimulates the intellectual diversity

necessary to understand and

accurately cover an increasinglydiverse society.

It is this diversity of minds and voices,

not just numbers, that matters.

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must adhere to predefined ethical

standards

(to be examined in week 13)

Documents

Week 3: The characteristics and role of journalism