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Dilemma Of Course Content And Curriculum In Indian Journalism Education: Theory, Practice And Research, C.S. H.N. Murthy
Dilemma Of Course Content And Curriculum In Indian Journalism Education: Theory, Practice And Research, C.S. H.N. Murthy
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Journalism and mass communication education in India has for a long time been stagnant and isolated from industrial needs and technological developments. One of the perceived deficiencies in journalism education is absence of a direct link between journalism schools and the industry. Another problem is universities—state, central and private institutions— have failed to formulate a common core curriculum to keep pace with the fast-changing media industry. Thus, media education continues to suffer from poorly designed courses, lack of rigorous contents in theory, practice and research. This paper examines the current state of journalism education in India based on an opinion …
Framing Religious Conflict: Primordialism Writ Large, Steve Sharp
Framing Religious Conflict: Primordialism Writ Large, Steve Sharp
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Is there a dynamic correspondence between the unfolding of media narratives about conflict and how that conflict plays out on the ground? In particular, can this question be applied productively to the Maluku wars, an outbreak of religious violence at the end of Indonesia’s long developmentalist epoch (1966-1998)? This paper argues that far from being disinterested purveyors of unproblematic truths, media workers are implicated in the creation and spread of ideas and images that shape the political discourses which exacerbate violent conflict. Its method is discourse analysis of a canon of journalism that reported the conflict in its first few …
Commentary: Educating Journalism Students To Do Comprehensive Reporting, Bella Mody
Commentary: Educating Journalism Students To Do Comprehensive Reporting, Bella Mody
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Citizens of every country need the news as information disseminator, interpreter, and public mobilizer. We cannot make sense of continued hunger, disease, and mass murder without knowledge of the (in) action of major governments, their multinational corporations, financial institutions, and representatives in the United Nations. Unfortunately, news coverage is often late, episodic, and inadequate in terms of historical and systemic background. When it addresses crises involving national minorities and foreign others, it is sometimes loaded with ethnocentric, racist, and pornographic descriptions of victims, with heroes mostly from the majority community or the global North. It is a truism that representations …
Commentary: The Intellectual Component In Best Practices Of Journalism, Padma Iyer
Commentary: The Intellectual Component In Best Practices Of Journalism, Padma Iyer
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Historically, the key questions facing journalism curriculum designers are: Should journalism education be about imparting a set of skills or the preparation of a philosophical mind infused with a spirit of inquiry? Is it about a way of doing or a way of knowing? The news industry have found the answers in a way that give them control over the education – or rather, the training – of journalists. Many organizations have set up their own “news universities” as have many teams of “retired” journalists. These inhouse learning centres typically have experienced journalists at the helm designing curriculum and enrolling …
Building The Perfect Graduate: What News Employers Want In New Hires, Ruth Callaghan, Joanna Mcmanus
Building The Perfect Graduate: What News Employers Want In New Hires, Ruth Callaghan, Joanna Mcmanus
Asia Pacific Media Educator
The converged media environment has prompted journalism educators to question whether they should increase the use of digital media technology in the classroom and teach across multiple platforms. Newsroom surveys, however, reveal that Australian and US news employers are emphasising traditional journalism skills. This paper examines whether journalism schools are producing graduates with skills sets that media organisations may not consider highly critical to a cadetship. Research was undertaken to examine graduate skills deemed most important by West Australian news employers. The findings echo US employers in their preference for traditional journalism skills, such as good writing, spelling, grammar and …
Are Predictions Of Newspapers’ Impending Demise Exaggerated?, Mary Garden
Are Predictions Of Newspapers’ Impending Demise Exaggerated?, Mary Garden
Asia Pacific Media Educator
The widespread view that newspapers, even in Australia, are suffering major declines is flawed, reflecting in part a North American and Eurocentric view of the press. Australian newspapers are faring better than many in the developed countries. Quality newspapers, with their clearly defined and targeted markets, are outperforming their tabloid counterparts. A fair assessment of newspaper performance needs to consider not only the circulation figures, but also readership and newspapers’ online reach. The latter is significant, as unlike the US and the UK, the main newspaper publishers Fairfax and News Limited dominate the online news field. Regardless of quantitative measures, …
Editorial: Back To Basics In Journalism Education Amid The Techno Hype, Eric Loo
Editorial: Back To Basics In Journalism Education Amid The Techno Hype, Eric Loo
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Dominating the discourse among journalism educators in the early ‘90s was how the internet would ‘revolutionise’ journalism practices, how newspapers would see its end days with readers turning to online news sites, and thus, the need to revamp traditional journalism curriculum and focus on ‘new media technologies’. Today, however, the smell and feel of newsprint is as pervasive as it was in 1991 during the days of the Netscape beta and HTML markups. Which reminds me of a remark by John C. Merrill, professor emeritus at the Missouri School of Journalism, at the AEJMC panel discussion I attended in Boston …
Commentary: Demise Of Newspapers And The Rise Of Cyberspace, Shelton Gunaratne
Commentary: Demise Of Newspapers And The Rise Of Cyberspace, Shelton Gunaratne
Asia Pacific Media Educator
The newspaper, as we know it - the actual broadsheet or tabloid that is delivered at our doorstep or purchased at the news stand - will cease to exist within the next 34 years, assert the scholars who trace the circulation and readership statistics in the United States. The era of the printed newspaper will end in the United States by 2043. A similar timeline may hold true for all countries with high Internet penetration and declining newspaper sales. So, we will see the end of the era of the print revolution, which began with Bi Sheng or Gutenberg (depending …
Communication Curricula At Universities In The Republic Of Korea: Evolution And Challenges In The Digital Age, Seok Kang
Asia Pacific Media Educator
This paper examines the current status, strengths and weaknesses of media communication curricula at 95 South Korean universities. It aims to find out whether the communication departments at South Korean universities reflect the global trend towards an integrated curriculum in the communication discipline as the literature suggests. This means a curriculum that integrates the theory, practice, and inter-disciplinary philosophies of Communication Studies, Journalism, Mass Communication, Advertising, Public Relations and Digital Media. The analysis shows that overall the current curricula in South Korean universities, which lean towards liberal-professional education, are relatively lacking in inter-disciplinarity. Most lacking is in the theory and …
Wiki Works: Developing New Modes Of Delivery For Journalism Students, Alexandra Wake
Wiki Works: Developing New Modes Of Delivery For Journalism Students, Alexandra Wake
Asia Pacific Media Educator
This commentary reports on the results of a pedagogical experiment in which second year feature writing students at RMIT University were asked to create Wikis of their favourite Australian feature writers. The implementation of the Wikis moved the teaching away from being centred on the lecturer to the students, thus allowing them greater flexibility in their collaborative work regardless of their physical location or their ability to be available at a particular time. This commentary recognises some of the challenges in setting such an activity and suggests ways the Wikis could be used in other universities.
Travel As A Teaching Approach For New Media Skills And Writing Courses, Bruce Garrison
Travel As A Teaching Approach For New Media Skills And Writing Courses, Bruce Garrison
Asia Pacific Media Educator
In today’s global community, local and overseas travels are essential to student learning. This paper posits that travel enhances students’ journalism experience and can be used to facilitate their education in new media and digital technology. Portable digital media technologies, which students are highly familiar with, create opportunities to teach them hands-on convergence and multimedia skills in travel-based journalism courses. The paper concludes with examples of how travel and new media technologies are combined to teach traditional news reporting, feature writing, travel writing, and other courses regardless of whether the program has an international or multimedia-convergence emphasis.
Student Journalists Learn About Aboriginal Communities And Culture In Western Australia, Trevor Cullen
Student Journalists Learn About Aboriginal Communities And Culture In Western Australia, Trevor Cullen
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Non-Aboriginal journalists seldom get to meet and talk with Aboriginal people about their life and beliefs, and this often results in narrow and misinformed reporting. This paper reports on a new initiative between the Combined Universities Centre for Rural Health (CUCRH) and the journalism program at Edith Cowan University (ECU) in Perth, Western Australia to help journalism students achieve a better understanding of Aboriginal communities and culture, and, consequently, a more informed approach to their reporting of Aboriginal issues. In July 2008, eight final-year ECU journalism students spent a month with Aboriginal communities in two Western Australian towns. The placement …
Commentary: Whetting A Journalist’S Appetite For Investigative Reporting, Yvonne Chua
Commentary: Whetting A Journalist’S Appetite For Investigative Reporting, Yvonne Chua
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Interest in investigative journalism has spiked in Asia and elsewhere, especially in new democracies, and along with it the demand for training in this field. The challenge for trainers in investigative reporting is to help journalists nimbly navigate what is often uncharted territory that demands dogged pursuit and unraveling of the truth. How to do it? This article shares with journalism trainers a few useful tips on getting journalists hooked on muckraking.
Commentary: Keeping Best Practices In Journalism Alive, Chay Florentino-Hofilena
Commentary: Keeping Best Practices In Journalism Alive, Chay Florentino-Hofilena
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Public regard for journalists or self-acclaimed journalists has not improved in the past few years. Newspaper readership continues to decline even as cable television, the Internet, and even pirated DVDs are offering a disgruntled public other information and entertainment options besides television or radio. The media get their much-needed shot in the arm whenever there are disasters or crisis situations in any part of the world. Suddenly, there is a sharp rise in news consumption as the public’s appetite for information reaches abnormal proportions. Even for just a few hours or even days, the media get to feel good about …
Commentary: Applying Aristotelian Rhetoric In Teaching ‘Social Responsibility’ To Advertising Students, Janice Wood
Commentary: Applying Aristotelian Rhetoric In Teaching ‘Social Responsibility’ To Advertising Students, Janice Wood
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Advertising is a highly visible business activity aimed at enticing potential customers to try new products and services. In the United States, advertising is monitored by the federal, state, and local governments, better business bureaus, the media, consumer groups, other advertisers, and the advertising industry itself – and criticized by all concerned. Overall, the common goals are to maximize the effectiveness of the commercials for the respective advertisers and minimize the negative impact on the American public. “Social responsibility” in advertising, as defined broadly in a popular textbook, involves “doing what society views as best for the welfare of people …
Q&A With John Mcmanus, Media ‘Bull Detector’, Eric Loo
Q&A With John Mcmanus, Media ‘Bull Detector’, Eric Loo
Asia Pacific Media Educator
MSNBC is pro-Obama, Fox News is anti. ABC is ‘neutral’, CNN is less so. Fox supports the war in Iraq, MSNBC opposes it. The Obama Administration prefers MSNBC to Fox, just as Bush prefers Fox to the New York Times. Indeed, the media are as politically biased as their editorial contents do not align with one’s politics. Hence, the liberals’ preference for PBS, CBS and New York Times in the coverage of the Obama presidential campaign than Fox News. Or, in my case, Malaysiakini, Malaysian Insider and Malaysia Today for critical coverage of Malaysian affairs than the mainstream papers, such …
Commentary: Media In The Uae: The Abu Dhabi Powerhouse, Alma Kadragic
Commentary: Media In The Uae: The Abu Dhabi Powerhouse, Alma Kadragic
Asia Pacific Media Educator
On April 17, 2008 the first issue of The National was published in Abu Dhabi, which was possibly the last startup of a major daily newspaper in the world. Top journalists were recruited from the UK, US and Canada. Founding editor-in-chief Martin Newland had previously edited the UK's Daily Telegraph and was deputy editor for the startup of Canada's National Post. Hassan Fattah, former Middle East correspondent for the New York Times, became deputy editor under Newland and replaced him 14 months after the launch. High salaries were paid to attract stars, including GBP320,000 (about USD512,000) annually to Newland, discovered …
Commentary: Words Matter: Journalists, Educators, Media Guidelines And Representation Of Disability, Shawn Burns
Commentary: Words Matter: Journalists, Educators, Media Guidelines And Representation Of Disability, Shawn Burns
Asia Pacific Media Educator
A four-letter word starting with ‘c’, and “humour” have served to reinforce the message – words matter. In June 2010, individual but disturbingly similar cases of racism rocked leading sporting codes and organisations in Australia - the National Rugby League (NRL) and the Australian Football League (AFL). Two former champion Australian sportsmen – one a recently retired rugby league star, Andrew Johns, and the other, a former Australian rules heavyweight, Mal Brown –were at the centre of a debate about words and, more importantly, the power of words. Johns was accused of racial vilification while serving as an assistant coach …
Opportunities For Journalism Education In An Online Entrepreneurial World, Stephen Quinn
Opportunities For Journalism Education In An Online Entrepreneurial World, Stephen Quinn
Asia Pacific Media Educator
The global financial crisis of 2008 and 2009 accelerated change in media houses around the world. As the value of media companies plummet, some newspapers have closed entirely or reduced staff numbers, while other publications have stopped printing and produce online-only editions. Others have chosen to outsource content. At the same time, new and evolving digital technologies are changing the way journalists operate. Some journalists are embracing multiple-media forms of reporting, and managers are coming to understand the need for a changed mindset. This paper argues that educators need to appreciate the issue of mindset, and prepare students for a …
Teaching Converged Media Through News Coverage Of The 2008 Us Presidential Election And Inauguration, Yanick Rice Lamb, Ingrid Sturgis, Charles B. Fancher
Teaching Converged Media Through News Coverage Of The 2008 Us Presidential Election And Inauguration, Yanick Rice Lamb, Ingrid Sturgis, Charles B. Fancher
Asia Pacific Media Educator
This commentary provides insights into how the journalism faculty at Howard University in Washington, DC tested the efficacy of its approach to teaching converged media techniques during the US presidential election on November 4, 2008 and the Inauguration of President Barack Obama on January 20, 2009. Coverage of both events were conducted by students supervised by faculty mentors.
Journalism Students’ Experience Of Mobile Phone Technology: Implications For Journalism Education, Paul Bethell
Journalism Students’ Experience Of Mobile Phone Technology: Implications For Journalism Education, Paul Bethell
Asia Pacific Media Educator
This study investigates journalism students’ usage of mobile phone technology when they begin their university studies and considers the implications of these baseline data for journalism education. This paper reports on the findings of three consecutive annual surveys of first year journalism students about their use of the applications available on their mobile phones. The surveys confirm that as well as using their phones to text and call, many are making video calls and most have shot photos and videos on their phones by the time they arrive at university. Many are using their phones to send or publish these …
Commentary: Teaching Media Convergence And Its Challenges, Serajul I. Bhuiyan
Commentary: Teaching Media Convergence And Its Challenges, Serajul I. Bhuiyan
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Many of my colleagues from journalism schools in the United States have for many years been bulking up on convergent media courses to prepare the next generation of reporters for an industry that is being reshaped by digital communication technologies. Concepts and theories of internet journalism were first taught during the days of HTML programming in the early1990s. Some have embraced the need to teach ‘new media’ skills wholeheartedly, some gingerly, and some not at all. What are the plausible reasons behind these mixed sentiments towards the teaching of convergent media courses? Are academics’ multimedia skills keeping pace with their …
Teaching Journalism Students And Regional Reporters How To Work With Cultural Diversity, Kristy Hess, Lisa Waller
Teaching Journalism Students And Regional Reporters How To Work With Cultural Diversity, Kristy Hess, Lisa Waller
Asia Pacific Media Educator
This paper examines the effectiveness of a set of curriculum materials developed for a Reporting Diversity and Integration Project tailored for Australian journalists and journalism students. The materials take a problem-based learning (PBL) approach to a hypothetical case study that involves Muslim netballers being banned from competition because they want to wear headscarves during play. Deferring to ideas developed by Russian psychologist, Leo Vygotsky, we proposed a few ‘scaffolding’ strategies to support student learning. The material was trialed with 30 first-year Deakin University journalism students and 30 regional journalists. The responses showed that both groups felt the materials we added …
Orientalism In Reporting Religion: Approaches To Teaching Journalism And Islam As A Civilization, Ahmad Murad Merican
Orientalism In Reporting Religion: Approaches To Teaching Journalism And Islam As A Civilization, Ahmad Murad Merican
Asia Pacific Media Educator
After years of discourse on the distortion of Islam by the media, this paper suggests that the link in understanding the (mis)representation of Islam is in the corpus of Orientalism. It argues that reporting on religions, or reporting on Islam, be adopted as critical components in the curricula of journalism education. It notes that in Malaysia, despite a proliferation of journalism/communication schools over more than three decades, there is no course on the reportage of religions/Islam. Such a course could be embedded in the historical contexts of encounters between the West and Islam and the assumption that the language of …
Commentary: Teaching ‘Best Practices’ Of Journalism In Malaysia, Mustafa K. Anuar
Commentary: Teaching ‘Best Practices’ Of Journalism In Malaysia, Mustafa K. Anuar
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Journalism has over the years invited distrust, scorn, cynicism, even sheer revulsion, from the general public. This is especially so with fraudulent reporting on the rise, such as the one committed by New York Times reporter Jayson Blair in 2003. Investigative journalism of the ‘Watergate’ type seems to have faded to the extent that it would take concerted effort by journalism educators to ‘excite’ students into taking up journalism as a career. In Malaysia, journalism ethics, standards and credibility have long been compromised at the altar of political expediency and corporate interests particularly within sections of the mainstream media. This …
Profile Interview: Stories That Need To Be Told In India, Eric Loo
Profile Interview: Stories That Need To Be Told In India, Eric Loo
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Investigative work by some of India’s renowned journalists, despite their limited access to the internet in remote areas, is still conducted in the tradition of working the streets, tenacious research, going undercover, negotiating the multi-layered bureaucracies, and engaging with the grassroots and often inaccessible sources. Among the well-known investigative journalism in India is the exposure of entrenched corruption in the Ministry of Defence by the English-language news site, Tehelka.com in 2001. A team of Tehelka journalists, disguised as arms dealers with hidden cameras, met with senior politicians and army officers to do a deal on procuring ‘thermal imaging binoculars’. Known …
Anti-Terrorism, Climate Change And ‘Dog Whistle’ Journalism: Restraints On The Public Right To Know, David Blackall, Seth Tenkate
Anti-Terrorism, Climate Change And ‘Dog Whistle’ Journalism: Restraints On The Public Right To Know, David Blackall, Seth Tenkate
Asia Pacific Media Educator
The original message on the ‘paradigm of prevention’, which obliges government to address the emergency from terrorism, was first coined by former US Attorney General John Ashcroft. Soon after, Australian Prime Minister of the day John Howard was to follow Ashcroft’s call. The new Labor government in 2007 deployed a fresh strategy: ‘the precautionary principle’ where government justifies further intrusive measures to confront the emergencies of climate change. This silent messaging as placed in the news media, by inclusion or omission of certain facts, can be traced and exposed to reveal a quietly agreed process to influence the public to …
Commentary: Journalism Education And The Reality Of Journalism Practice, Judith Clarke
Commentary: Journalism Education And The Reality Of Journalism Practice, Judith Clarke
Asia Pacific Media Educator
A graduate of our journalism course joined a local Hong Kong paper as a reporter. He was sent to write a story about an elderly mainland Chinese couple who regularly overstayed their two-week tourist permits to run a quilt shop in Kowloon. They would come across the border for the good business season before the lunar new year and go back when things quietened down, with border officials apparently turning a blind eye. A small story, with a little guilt for the reporter because he was instructed by his editor to tell the pair he was actually promoting their shop. …
The Development Reporting Outline, Warief Djajanto Basorie
The Development Reporting Outline, Warief Djajanto Basorie
Asia Pacific Media Educator
Reporters are commonly criticized for their incomplete reporting. One way to produce a comprehensive report is to approach an assignment with a methodical plan. The reporting outline is such a plan whereby for journalists to think through six components: the theme, the topic, reference material, sources, angles, and questions. The Jakarta-based Dr. Soetomo Press Institute (Lembaga Pers Dr. Soetomo, LPDS) has conducted numerous journalism workshops throughout Indonesia. A common observation from these workshops is that often news stories in the local press are not comprehensive. A tell-tale sign of inadequate reporting effort is the questions readers ask about the substance …
One Incident, Two Stories: News Coverage Of The Sino-Us Mid-Air Collision, Jiang Jinlong, Hao Xiaoming
One Incident, Two Stories: News Coverage Of The Sino-Us Mid-Air Collision, Jiang Jinlong, Hao Xiaoming
Asia Pacific Media Educator
This study examined media bias in covering international conflicts through a comparison of People’s Daily and The New York Times’s coverage of the 2001 incident in which a US surveillance plane collided with a Chinese fighter off China’s coast. Through a content analysis of 137 news reports and commentaries from People’s Daily and 81 from The New York Times on the incident, this study shows that despite differences between the two newspapers in terms of their political and media environments and journalistic traditions, they were not significantly different in terms of journalistic bias in covering the incident. Both papers were …