In this struggling economy, what strategies might you consider to enhance your likelihood for successful face-to-face meetings with advertisers? What should you bring along in addition to a copy of your newspaper and your newspaper’s website stats? Where would you turn? How would you gather the necessary information? Whom should you ask? What is available, both easily accessible and inexpensive?
Many of us have asked ourselves these questions during our selling and sales management careers. In my case, it was during my tenure at a small northern Illinois daily just after college. For you it might be the daily r, weekly where you work. No matter what the circulation size or frequency of your newspaper, having an out-of-date, inadequate, or nonexistent pitch book can be both frustrating and discouraging to your sales efforts.
What’s a pitch book?
It is all the necessary information you need to help potential advertisers visualize why they should invest ad dollars (… new and additional revenue!) in your newspaper or website.
A pitch book is not a rate card. It is more than that! A pitch book ideally is a binder that contains information on your market, your newspaper, your competition, plus additional data you need to tell and sell your newspaper's story.
Developing a pitch book, even the most fundamental one, does not have to be a formidable, time consuming or expensive task. It is possible even if you are at a newspaper that has limited research resources, both human and financial.
Let's consider for a moment building your own bare bones pitch book. It may be bare bones initially, but as you use it, adding to and subtracting from, it will become a well-used and trusted ally in your progress toward sales success.
How, you ask, will you be able to develop a pitch book with limited or no research resources? It's easy, and it can be fun. It will teach you more about your market, your newspaper, and your competition.
First, you will need to refocus those selling skills and do a little bit of investigative work. Ask lots of questions.
But what are we going to investigate? Available, and in some cases free, resources to develop more facts, data, and information about your market, your newspaper, and your competition in order to create, build, and refine your pitch book.
What resources? Where? Right there, in front of you. Consider the following everyday sources of information:
For Market Information — The first, and possibly the best, resource may be your own newspaper. Don't overlook any departments or personnel (advertising, editorial,circulation, newsroom, and senior management). Begin a reference file featuring photocopies of news stories about your market (its growth, changes, population, schools, new retailers/employers, demographics). Don't forget to tag each story with the newspaper's name and date of story. In addition, keep an eye out for feature stories about your market in other area newspapers, regional business journals, and even your competition!
Another resource is Realtors, both commercial and residential; Banks; Savings & Loans; Credit Unions — all of these businesses track their customer base and how it relates to your market and their business. Ask them if they will share the information with you, volunteer to share your information, and give appropriate credit for the information. New housing starts, average home price, new payroll dollars, growth in retail sales, available/spend able income dollars are all important to your potential advertisers and help sell your market, and your paper.
Also, local college/university/branch campus, libraries, and government sources, both national (Small Business Administration) and local (Chamber of Commerce, Grange, County Economic Development Council) — these are great sources for economic (Censusstatistics, population, age, income, educational information) and historical (your local town origin, county origin, reasons behind largest town social/economic event) data. All of this information helps you paint the picture about your market and the people your newspaper serves.
Do not overlook checking and reviewing any and all of your local market’s websites, including your newspaper’s, your competitor’s (radio, television, yellow pages, direct mail, billboards) and other print niche publications.
For Newspaper Information— As with your search for market information, your first resources may be your newspaper and your newspaper’s website. Talk to everyone within your newspaper organization and search out any information regarding your newspaper's history, goals and mission, readership, unique visitors, and circulation. Strategically plan how you will use this information to tell your story to your potential advertisers. Begin writing your story, by using individual facts and data, demonstrating how your newspaper and your newspaper’s web site will bring your audience (the buyers) and your advertiser (the seller) together.
If your newspaper sources are limited and incomplete, reach out and ask your state press association for assistance. They are a wealth of information, perhaps not as much on your market, but on the state overall and the newspaper industry in particular. Your state press association will have lots of resources available. Whether it's current circulation trends, average readers per copy, who is reading newspapers, who visits newspaper websites, how well newspapers and their websites work or the emerging technology questions regarding the Internet — your newspaper association can help you.
In addition to your local press association, the Newspaper Association of America and the National Newspaper Associationare repositories for the newspaper industry and related areas (couponing, retail sales trends, population shifts, newspaper readership, and new technologies). In Texas, the Centeris an easily accessible resource for you. Last but not least, network with other newspapers in your region or state to discuss what's new, what's available, what's working.
For Competitive Information— just ask. To learn about your competition and what they are doing in your market, ask those advertisers, both existing and new, if they would share their competitive strategy (and information) with you. Call your competition, ask some questions, and request a rate card or media kit. You do not have to identify yourself, and if you are not asked you do not need to tell them who you are or why you are calling. Then again, if your competitor asks, and you identify yourself, what is the worst they can say? No.
To learn about a particular medium (cable, radio, direct mail) call an out-of-market competitor, who will probably give you specific information on their station or mailing and broad based information on the media, radio or direct mail, which you can use.
Keep looking for new resources. Keep updating your pitch book. It's your pitch book. Make it work for you. It will help you become the resource your advertisers turn to first when they need information and, in the process, build your confidence and belief in yourself, newspapers, your newspaper and its website.
The Texas Center for Community Journalism at Texas Christian University is embarking on a statewide initiative to investigate the fairness of in the Texas criminal justice system, especially in cases that deal with indigent defense. The project is being underwritten by the Hood County News.
Kathy Cruz, staff writer for the News and a consultant in investigative reporter for the Center, is writing the series about the quality of legal services in Texas and the impact of the justice system on those who are accused of crimes, as well as the impact on their families.
The stories are being provided to community newspapers throughout the state free of charge, and papers will be encouraged to investigate the quality of legal services within their own counties.
“I cannot think of a more important project,” said Jerry Tidwell, publisher of the News. “Community newspapers typically do not have the staff and the resources to take in-depth looks at statewide issues. This is a way to help them and, in the process, provide a service to the people of Texas.”
Tommy Thomason, director of the Center, said he hopes that Texas community newspapers will use the series as a starting point to look at issues relating to the court system in their city and county.
“We see this series as a starting place for many other investigations around Texas,” Thomason said. “We all have a tremendous stake in the fairness of the criminal justice system, and newspapers have a responsibility to the public to be watchdogs on that system. If newspapers don’t do it, who will?”
To download one of the files below, just click on the file name. The images will open in your Web browser and you can use File > Save to save the image to your computer. The text files will open in your computer's default text-editing program. For a description of the various images that are part of the project, see the file "justice for all photos.docx". For the series logo you see on the right, see the file JusticeTCCJSeriesLogo.pdf.
The Texas Center for Community Journalism at Texas Christian University is embarking on a statewide initiative to investigate one of Texas’ most celebrated murder convictions, the Darlie Routier case. The project is being underwritten by the Hood County News.
Kathy Cruz, staff writer for the News and a consultant in investigative reporting for the Center, is writing the series about the case and questions that have arisen about the verdict. Routier is currently on death row awaiting execution.
The stories are being provided to community newspapers throughout the state free of charge.
The case has already spawned TV documentaries and books. The Center is presenting this series because it highlights several controversial issues within the criminal justice system. TCCJ does not take a stand on Routier’s guilt or innocence, but the Center hopes these stories will focus attention on these controversial issues about the way crime is investigated and prosecuted.
To download one of the files below, just click on the file name. The images will open in your Web browser and you can use File > Save to save the image to your computer. The text files will open in your computer's default text-editing program. For a description of the various images that are part of the project, see the file "Routier photos.doc". For the series logo you see on the right, see the file RoutierTCCJserieslogo.pdf.
Another tip to good writing is to avoid fad, cliché, and jargon. Fad is trendy, of-the-moment expression often generated by popular entertainment and entertainers. Clichés are once catchy but now tired expression. And jargon can be useful or bewildering, depending upon your audience.
Most professions generate their own jargon or terminology—there’s academese, legalese, bureaucratese, and others. The jargon in those specialties is usually OK if the writers are addressing readers who share not only their profession but also its vocabulary.
Media jargon, however, doesn’t communicate well. Journalese is hackneyed media expression that depends upon journalistic clichés so overused that they amuse more than they communicate. It’s journalese that gives us high-speed chases and bullet-riddled bodies. It gives us surprise moves and bizarre twists. It gives us drug lords and lone gunmen and grieving widows and bearded dictators and fugitive financiers.
Journalese also gives us an overworked vocabulary—verbs and nouns such as fueling or spurring or sparking or targeting or skyrocketing or spiraling or escalating . . . A storm dumps more than five inches of rain and spawns hurricane-force winds and golfball-sized hail.
In journalese, police find a dead body—as opposed to a live body—in a densely wooded area.
Or a highly placed official is under fire for allegations of wrongdoing.
What’s telling about journalese is that while media folks might write it, they seldom speak it. And if they did— well, imagine! Here, Russell Scott will help me show you how it could sound when two media types meet on the street.
____________________
Paula: Hello, Russell.
Russell: Hello, Paula. What’s going on at your journalistic facility?
Paula: Amid a burgeoning crisis spawned by my boss, he hurled a litany, even a laundry list, of verbal insults at me and launched an unprovoked attack on my immediate supervisor, 45. His behavior triggered a firestorm of criticism from staff members, who weighed in on the issue and unleashed a new round of difficulty.
Russell: Such a heated exchange can quickly escalate into a defining moment, or even a critical mass.
Paula: You betcha. In the wake of the controversy, the boss suggested I could level the playing field by an immediate withdrawal—by resigning!
Russell: Whoa, the R-word! Worst-case scenario!
Paula: I don’t know who the architect of that plan was, but I hotly contested it and mounted a staunch defense. But! Then the idea was hailed by high-ranking officials who said it might send a very clear signal to the staff, going forward.
Russell: More like a chilling effect, I’d guess. But at the end of the day, these unprecedented developments must seem a daunting challenge.
Paula: We’re in the midst of negotiations and hope to hammer out an agreement on a key provision. Looks like there might be some wiggle room. But the bottom line may be that there’s a thin line between a soft and a hard line.
Russell: So there could be a sea change, maybe even a ground swell. Instead of a staggering defeat, you could see a stunning victory!
Paula: Better than getting shipped off to delegate-rich New York to be a source on the ground.
Russell: Or to the oil-rich Middle East. So does this storm of controversy decimate your hopes for a promotion?
Paula: Those hopes are in a sudden downturn. Or a steep decline. Or a sharp decrease. Maybe even a free fall. But let’s just say I’m cautiously optimistic.
Russell: So you’re saying the outcome is unclear? Or maybe that it remains to be seen?
Paula: At the end of the day, that’s probably arguably true.
____________________
OK! So that’s how it might sound if journalists spoke as they wrote. Makes you wonder, though, if it wouldn’t be better if they instead wrote as they spoke?
In this segment of Tips From a Writing Coach, we’ll discuss the first of our writing tips: Keep sentences short.
Over the centuries, accomplished writers have agreed that less is more. Samuel Butler said a century ago that it was “easier to be long than short.” And another quotation—variously attributed to Cicero, Voltaire, Pascal, Mark Twain, and Ernest Hemingway—goes: “I would have written you a shorter letter, but I didn’t have the time.” Whoever first said it, they’re all correct.
But brevity is a lot easier recommended than executed. Bear in mind that the period is one of the reader’s (and the writer’s) best friends. Generally, when a sentence approaches 20 words or so, we should seek a way to end it. Remember, however, that sentence length average is more important than the length of any one sentence. Aim for a wide variety of sentence lengths. Variety not only makes your writing conversational but it also helps avoid tedium. That said, a safe average is 20 to 25 words. That means you’ll have short sentences (as short as one word), medium-length sentences (12 to18 words), and longish sentences (18 to 25 words).
But word count doesn’t tell the whole story. Let’s repeat the sentence that ended my last statement, for example. That sentence has 21 words and should be OK. Here’s the sentence: That means you’ll have short sentences (as short as one word), medium-length sentences (12 to18 words), and longish sentences (18 to 25 words).
Although that sentence has, as I said, only 21 words, it qualifies as a “difficult” sentence because of its numbers and its parenthetical interruptions. Those elements have a lengthening and muddying effect because they disturb the natural sentence flow of subject to verb to object.
Does this mean that I mustn’t write that sentence? No, it doesn’t. Does it mean that I need short, crisp sentences before and after? Yes.
Now, notice the ploy I just used. Instead of making the passage even more complicated by surrounding the difficult sentence with equally difficult sentences, I instead asked short, simple, conversational questions—Does this mean I mustn’t write that sentence? Does it mean I need short sentences before and after? Those short questions allow me to answer with even shorter sentences: No, it doesn’t. And: Yes. That kind of pacing adds pause and the oral equivalent of “white space”—which gives the reader a rest. That kind of pacing also is more interesting because it adds variety—the kind of variety natural in speech.
Before we go on, let’s mention a software tool that will help you judge the simplicity of your own writing. Microsoft Word, which you probably use, has a readability index that measures the sentence length average of a piece of writing, its grade level, and its “reading ease.” (This readability index tool is usually in your computer’s grammar checker software. You can turn it on in Word’s “preferences,” and it will appear on your screen automatically after you’ve run the grammar- or spell-checker.) Now, we know we’re looking for a sentence-length average of below 25. Beyond sentence length, studies show that most readers—even the highly educated—prefer to read at a 10th-grade level or below. We also learn that a suitable score on the “reading ease” index is above 60.
So let’s see what this Word software has to say regarding the readability of this somewhat technical commentary you’re listening to. My remarks to this point have an average sentence length of 15, a reading grade level of 7.9, and a “reading ease” index of 65. We also find that the average number of characters per word is 4.6. So my short words—as well as short sentences, low grade level, and reading ease index—should ensure a simple and accessible writing style.
Therefore, what I’ve written so far should be clear. However, let’s note that you’re not reading but hearing. The demand for brevity and simplicity is even more critical for a listening audience. After all, listeners can’t look back at the spoken sentence; they must rely on memory. So, for speeches or other oral presentations, we should perhaps meet even more stringent demands for brevity and simplicity.
Am I suggesting that you analyze every sentence you write the way I just analyzed one of mine? No. But if you’ve never discovered where your writing “style” resides, it would be good to find out. Is your sentence length average typically 25 words, or 50? Is the grade level of your writing the 10th grade, or the 20thgrade—that is, 8 years in higher education? Is your “reading ease” score 60, or 30? All this information can be yours with the click of a computer mouse.
Again, the goal of these readability tools—as well as of my writing tips—is to craft prose so quick and natural that the reader understands with a single reading. No need to re-read. No need to puzzle out the writer’s intent. In other words, no need for the readers to do the writer’s work. Much besides sentence length goes into that kind of readability, but other considerations aside, long, dense sentences always make fuzzy reading. I won’t try to prove the point by reciting to you a long and densely written passage. Trust me: You wouldn’t like it!
We talked last time about three basic attributes of good writing. Those ideals were accuracy, clarity, and brevity. If our writing—any writing—is accurate, clear, and brief, we won’t go very far wrong.
By saying we won’t go very far wrong, I’m not promising perfection, but I am promising that the writing will be successful. It will be readable and understandable—that is, it will do what good writing is supposed to do.
And what is good writing supposed to do? Good writing is simply good communication—that is, it transmits a message precisely, plainly, and quickly. It has, in short, the same humble goal as speech. It’s no accident that the best writing is also conversational writing.
In other words, writing well can be hard, but it isn’t as hard as we make it.
How can we ensure that our writing is as good—and as easy, both for reader and writer—as possible? Are there shortcuts to the readable and understandable prose that readers want? There are. And I’m going to share some of those with you right now. You might want to grab something to write with. But if that’s not possible, don’t worry—we’ll discuss these tips one at a time in future commentaries on writing well.
Also, these tips are examined in detail in Part One of my book The Book on Writing: The Ultimate Guide to Writing Well.
The tips we’ll discuss are not by any means all there is to say on the subject. But taken together, they form the bedrock of good writing. Right now, we’ll present the tips without elaboration so you’ll see the whole picture before we look at its parts. Notice that these tips are relatively easy to put into practice, and that they apply to any kind of writing.
The first of my writing tips says to Keep Sentences Short.
The second is to Avoid Jargon, Fad, & Cliché
The third says to Be Wary of Anecdotal Leads
4. [is to] Avoid Pretensions
5. [is to] Avoid Overblown or Mangled Metaphor
6. [is to] Cut Wordiness
7. Avoid Vague Qualifiers
8. Don't Back into the Beginning
9. [is] A Primer on Pronunciation
And my tenth and final tip says: Don’t be Fooled by Language Myth
Those are some of the most important shortcuts to writing well. If we make them second nature, all our writing will be not only easier and quicker to read, but also easier and quicker to write.
Please join me next time—when we’ll discuss exactly what it means to keep sentences short and why it’s really not quite that simple. And how short, precisely? That short? Really? All of them?
The newspaper is the epicenter of a small town. But when you put the newspaper and radio station together, it can create an even bigger news center.
In Ozona, The Ozona Stockman and KYXX-FM Radio have partnered together for two years to bring news and events to the community.
Every Wednesday, I inform listeners on KYXX about all the news in that week’s paper. With DJ Eligio Martinez, I give “teases” about the articles, talk about upcoming events and even give breaking news updates.
One week a serious accident north of Ozona closed down part of a road and I used my time on the radio to inform travelers of the detour in that area.
Last year during the county’s devastating wildfires, the Stockman would get information about road closures and traffic delays, along with donations and other important news, to the station.
It’s a show that many of our readers look forward to every week. So many people have told me they grab their newspapers and follow along with me on the radio.
Along with the Wednesday show, the Stockman provides the radio station updates on election nights and shares breaking news and information that needs to get out to the public.
In turn, the radio station helps the Stockman by providing local sports updates and information as well.
The Stockman helps sponsor local sporting events on the radio, and the station runs an ad in the Stockman promoting my show. Martinez will mention the Stockman for various news and information throughout the rest of the week and we share links to the radio station’s web broadcasts on our Facebook page and website.
It’s a tradeout for both of us. It’s also a win-win situation for our small town.
The community is also very supportive of both media outlets when it comes to advertising.
“We are happy to have this great relationship with The Ozona Stockman. It’s been very beneficial to our community. You won’t find this kind of relationship very often in the advertising business,” Martinez said.
In addition to giving the news, I also talk about the other services the newspaper offers, such as selling office supplies and commercial printing.
People often bring me news for the paper and ask me to mention it on the radio. And people take news to the radio station and ask them to share with the newspaper. It’s really a great partnership and it really puts a voice to our newspaper.
You can find the Ozona Stockman at www.ozonastockman.com.
It’s what happens when newspapers pay attention, when they actively encourage reader-friendly writing.
So we’re beginning a weekly series of tips on good writing here on our website. It’s a series designed for busy reporters and writers. In fact, it’s all on podcast, so you can listen while you’re doing something else.
The podcasts feature America’s Writing Coach, Paula LaRocque. Paula has spoken at our workshops before, and there’s nobody better to explain what makes writing effective. The first week’s podcast is the three attributes of good writing. And next week, we’ll release another.
You can use these podcasts to structure your own writing improvement program at your newspaper. For instance, bring in burgers or pizza for a “writer’s lunch” once a week. Over lunch, listen to the podcast. Then talk about how to apply those principles to your newspapers. Have some papers at the meeting, so you can skim some articles and see how they could be improved, using the principles Paula talked about that day.
Even if you only make these available for staff members to listen at their computers, we think you’ll begin to see improvements – good writing flourishes in atmospheres where we think about it and talk about it and look for ways to implement it.
And watch next week for the next installment of Paula’s writing tips.
Listen to Paula’s first session here: /training/3-attributes-good-writing
In the following Q & A, we ask author and educator Paula LaRocque about the basics of writing well.
Paula is one of the country’s foremost writing coaches. She’s taught thousands of professionals in the United States, Canada, and Europe. She served as writing coach for the Associated Press, the European Stars & Stripes, and the Drehscheibe Institute in Germany. She taught writing at Texas Christian, Southern Methodist, Texas A&M, and Western Michigan universities, and for 20 years was writing coach at The Dallas Morning News. She’s author of four books, and in 2001 received the Associated Press Managing Editors highest honor: the Meritorious Service Award for Exemplary Contribution to Journalism.
Q. Paula, thank you for being willing to speak with us about writing.
A. You’re welcome.
Q. We know you’ve developed specific guidelines for writing well. We also know that one of those guidelines is to get right to the point. So let’s get right to the point: In a few words, what constitutes good writing?
A. Accuracy. Clarity. Brevity.
Q. It’s that simple?
A. It’s that complex. Accuracy is simple enough. No decent writer questions the need for accuracy; you just commit to truth and fact in content, and to Standard English in form. Nor do writers balk at the need for clarity and brevity—in someone else’s work.
Q. Not in their own?
A. I’ve found that the weaker the writer, the stronger the resistance to clarity and brevity. We can liken that reaction to the mountain granny’s response to the preacher’s Sunday sermon. Every time the preacher condemned the sins of the other parishioners—moonshinin’, say—she’d cry Amen, brother! and spit tobacco juice emphatically into the spittoon. Or say he condemned lyin’ and thievin’. She’d cry Amen! Amen! and send saliva ringing against the spittoon. And when it came to coveting thy neighbor’s wife—well, it was Amen! Amen! Amen!
But! When the preacher mentioned the “sins” of chewin’ tobaccy and dippin’ snuff, the ol’ granny sat back in disgust and muttered: “Now he done stopped his preachin’ and gone to meddlin’!”
Q. [Laughter] I guess it depends upon whose ox is being gored. But why would anyone resist such worthy ideals as clarity and brevity in writing?
A. They are worthy ideals, but achieving them often takes hard, slogging work. After all, simple English is no one’s mother tongue. And the weakest writers are going to have to work the hardest, and to change the most. So it’s often easier to reject the idea that one’s writing is unclear than it is to clarify it.
And let me ask you: When are writers rewarded for the extra work of being clear and brief? Clarity and brevity are all but invisible. The readers know only that they’ve read quickly and understood well. It might not occur to them that being able to read quickly and understand well is to the writer’s credit. Literate readers will immediately understand when the writing is accurate, clear, and concise. I can add that the writing we love—the writing we call seamless or beautiful or compelling—is inevitably clear writing. Maybe we love without always knowing why.
Here’s another question: When are we taught to recognize the simple mechanical attributes of muddy writing—especially when the writing is our own? Put another way, when was Blather 101 part of the curriculum? Consider the CEO who wrote: “Financial exigencies made it necessary for the company to implement budgetary measures to minimize expenditures.” When I suggested that he write instead: “We had to cut costs,” he accused me of changing his style. Here’s an educated professional who thinks mumbo-jumbo is a “style.” And worse, that it’s a style worth cultivating.
Q. Are there simple and recognizable mechanical attributes in poor writing?
A. Yes. And some are as easy and routine as the number of words in a sentence. Or the number of ideas in a sentence. Or the number of prepositions. Or numbers themselves.
A. OK, so let’s have a crash course in Blather 101.
A. Trying to impress rather than to communicate. Wordiness. Empty, showy, pretentious, abstract, timid, overqualified, euphemistic phrasing. Hiding one’s uncertain grasp of the subject in gobbledygook. Or hiding one’s fear of clarity in a veil of ambiguity . . . I’m remembering a reporter who remarked when we’d rewritten some of his stories: “If I’m going to be that clear, I’d better also be that right.”
Q. So how about a crash course in good writing—Writing Tips 101?
A. You’ve heard writing experts say to write as you speak. But that goes too far and yet not far enough. It’s more helpful to say that we should write as we speak when we speak well. Avoid the trite or hackneyed—journalese and media-speak, for example. Skip clichés and trendy talk and use your own fresh vocabulary.
Know there’s a difference between simplicity and the simple-minded, and put away forever the notion that clarity dumbs anything down. Write below the tenth-grade reading level as calculated by your computer’s software—because studies show that even the most highly educated readers prefer to read at or below that level. And remember that the more difficult the subject, the simpler the writing about that subject should be. I say this because some writers use the difficult subject as an excuse for a difficult style.
Prefer short sentences and short words. Prune prepositions and numbers. Lose qualifiers such as very, really, completely, rather, quite, etcetera, and use instead precise words that need no qualification.
Oh, and have little faith in your computer’s grammar checker. What the computer does well, it does very well. But it is a machine and therefore reacts in rote. But grammar and usage are not always rote. In short, artificial intelligence is wonderful, but sometimes we need the real thing.
Q. So we’ve gone full circle—back to accuracy and the importance of accuracy.
A. Yep. And I done stopped my meddlin’. . . . Let me just add that what we’ve said here is largely abstract. But in my writing tips to come, we’ll put some meat on these bones. We’ll look at concrete and simple techniques for making any writing better—as well as easier and faster.
Q. We’ll look forward to that. Thank you, Paula LaRocque.
Cultural competence has been embraced by a number of professions whose members interact with culturally diverse communities. Yet the concept has been criticized as being narrowly conceived and ill-defined and lacking effective measures. This study attempts to refine the definition and measures of cultural competence, applying the concept through a textual analysis of the multimedia news texts of student journalists reporting on inner-city communities. The study found that multimedia practices offer the potential to move news texts toward a more culturally competent approach to journalism. Additionally, reporters need to develop strategies to negotiate their “insider-outsider” status in culturally diverse communities.
Key words: Cultural competence; community journalism; Others; inner-city neighborhood
The need for a better understanding about communities and cultures other than our own has taken on a new urgency, given today’s rapidly expanding process of globalization, increasingly diverse domestic populations, and increased engagement through digital technologies. An important way that people at home and across the globe learn about communities and perspectives other than their own is through the mass media, including the news media (Bennett, 2005; Brennen & Duffy, 2003; Gans, 1979/1980; Lippmann, 1922; The Commission on Freedom of the Press, 1947; Tuchman, 1978). Yet, journalists have long been criticized for their inability to cross cultural boundaries and report about communities and perspectives that may differ from their own (Brennen & Duffy, 2003; Gans, 2011, 1979/1980; Natarajan & Xiaoming, 2003; Said, 1978). In response, some scholars have called for a new approach to mass communication and, in particular, journalism that includes multiple perspectives to provide more inclusive coverage and promote understanding (Gans, 2011, 1979/1980; JanMohamed, 1992; Mowlana, 1984; Ward, 2005).
Many professions have begun to address the issue of inclusiveness and the ability to work effectively with individuals and communities from cultures different from their own by embracing the concept of “cultural competence.” These professions include social work, psychology, public relations, business, government, education, and health care (Craig, Hull, Haggart, & Perez-Selles, 2000; D’Andrea, Daniels, & Heck, 1991; Doutrich & Story, 2004; Johnston & Herzig, 2006; National Association of Social Workers, 2001; Leiba-O’Sullivan, 1999). Georgetown University’s Center for Child and Human Development features a National Center for Cultural Competence (National Center for Cultural Competence, 2012).
This study applies the concept of cultural competence to journalists by examining the ways in which reporters portray culturally different “Others” in their news texts. The theoretical frameworks used in the study include the social construction of reality, which addresses how people within social groups interpret the world around them (Berger & Luckmann, 1966; Schutz, 1944), and concepts related to social cognition including schema, attribution, and cognitive complexity, which address how individuals construct and perceive the world around them (Fiske & Taylor, 1984; Hamilton, Devine, & Ostrom, 1994). The ways in which reporters are influenced by their social groups and personal experiences have the potential to affect the way in which they perceive and report on culturally diverse communities and culturally different “Others.” These perceptions can make their way into news content, and audiences could in turn be influenced by these texts.
As Krippendorff (2004) noted, a text “means something to someone, it is produced by someone to have meanings for someone else, and these meanings therefore must not be ignored” (p. 19). Hall (1997) wrote that the importance of texts is situated in their function; they construct and transmit meaning. Language and texts, he wrote, “operate as symbols, which stand for or represent (i.e., symbolize) the meaning we wish to communicate” [italics added] (p. 5).
Thus, afundamental aspect of journalists’ work is the news text they produce and the potential meanings they construct. Increasingly, journalists’ texts involve more than written articles. They also include multimedia content such as videos, photos, photo galleries, and blogs, all published over the Internet. Multimedia, short for “multiple media,” is defined as “using various forms and combinations of media – sounds, text, video, animations (and anything else that may come along) – and presenting them to users/consumers of that content” (Wilkinson, Grant, & Fisher, 2009, p. 165). Multimedia journalism has been defined as the “presentation of a news story package on a Web site using two or more media formats” (Deuze, 2004, p. 140).
This study examines multimedia news coverage of urban communities that is published on a university-based website devoted to hyperlocal coverage of one city’s neighborhoods. The coverage can be considered part of community journalism, a concept that has been evolving after having first been conceived as reporting on specific geographical locations such as small towns, suburbs, and particular neighborhoods in large cities (Reader, 2012). Community journalism is distinct from other kinds of journalism in a number of ways, including that it has been characterized by the close relationship between the journalists and members of their audience. Today, the notion of community journalism has expanded to encompass coverage of special-interest magazines, hyperlocal websites and communities that are not tied to a particular location, including virtual communities, which makes the concept ripe for further investigation (Rosenberry, 2012).
Specifically, this study closely examines the multimedia news texts of student reporters covering cultures and communities that are different from their own to identify factors that influence the cultural competence of journalists and to determine whether the students’ texts demonstrate a culturally competent approach to journalism.
CULTURAL COMPETENCE: CURRENT CONCEPTUALIZATIONS AND CRITICISMS
Cultural competence, sometimes referred to as cross-cultural competence or multicultural competence, broadly involves the extent to which individuals develop the awareness, knowledge, and skills necessary to understand and work effectively with communities and people from diverse cultures (D’Andrea, Daniels, & Heck, 1991; Sue, 1991; Sue, Arredondo, & McDavis, 1992). Sue, a scholar in the field of psychology, began developing the notion of cultural competence in 1982, categorizing the concept with the dimensions of attitudes and beliefs, knowledge and skills (Sue, 2001). The first dimension later was updated as “awareness” (Sue et al., 1992). The awareness dimension, according to Sue (2001), involved the counselor’s acknowledgement of his or her own attitudes and beliefs, including assumptions, biases, and notions about other cultures and the world, the role of racism and oppression in society, and the impact of social and cultural influences on human functioning; the knowledge dimension involved an understanding of the worldview of the culturally “different” client, or the client’s values and assumptions about human behavior; and the skills dimension involved the practice of appropriate and sensitive intervention strategies. Sue (2001) further updated his model of cultural competence to include the dimensions of foci of cultural competence (individual, professional, organizational, and societal) and race- and culture-specific attributes (African American, Asian American, Latino American, Native American, and European American).
Scholars and practitioners in the fields of psychology, nursing and social work have embraced cultural competence and, like Sue, have attempted to expand the concept’s dimensions. Sodowsky, Taffe, Gutkin, and Wise (1994) found that knowledge and skills were not enough for one to be a culturally skilled counselor and suggested that cultural competence models include a dimension that assesses the impact of cultural and racial attitudes on the dynamics of the counseling relationship. Other scholars have proposed dimensions for cultural competence such as the seeking out “cultural encounters” and “cultural desire,” which refer to professionals’ motivation to engage in the process of becoming more culturally aware (Campinha-Bacote, 2007). Another study advocated for “cultural proficiency” to replace the concept of cultural competence as a way to achieve culturally appropriate nursing care (Wells, 2000). Cultural proficiency, according to Wells, would integrate the dimensions of cultural competence into the culture of an organization, as well as in professional practice, teaching, and research. While these and other additional dimensions of cultural competence have been proposed, Sue’s original three dimensions of awareness, knowledge, and skills continue to form the basis of most cultural competence research, training and education programs today.
Meanwhile, the fields of mental health and social work in particular are rife with cultural competence tools and scales. The Multicultural Awareness-Knowledge-Skills Survey (MAKSS) is a 60-item survey used to assess, through multiple-choice questions, a measure of social work students’ perceptions of their level of multicultural counseling awareness, knowledge, and skills (D’Andrea, Daniels, & Heck, 1991). Using a four-point Likert scale ranging from very limited to very aware, for example, students answer questions such as “At this time in your life, how would you rate your understanding of the impact of the way you think and act when interacting with persons of different cultural backgrounds?” or “In general, how would you rate your level of awareness regarding different cultural institutions and systems?” Another instrument is Ponterotto’s Multicultural Counseling Knowledge and Awareness Scale (MCKAS), a 32-item, self-reporting measure with a seven-point Likert scale; each scale contains 20 items that pertain to social workers’ awareness and knowledge (Kohl, 2005). Respondents are asked to rate on a scale ranging from “Not at All True” to “Totally True” a series of statements such as, “I think that clients who do not discuss intimate aspects of their lives are being resistant and defensive” or “I am comfortable with differences that exist between me and my clients in terms of race and beliefs.”
In a study of the cultural competence of communication professionals, Freitag (2002) assessed the ability of U.S. public relations practitioners to undertake international assignments through a survey instrument, looking at the practitioners’ college study of foreign languages and subjects such as non-U.S. history and economics, as well as professional and nonprofessional international travel. He found that cumulative time spent outside the United States was the best indicator of the practitioners’ cultural competence, while college study of non-U.S. subjects and foreign languages were partial indicators of cultural competence.
In qualitative studies of cultural competence, researchers have examined the concept through individual and group interviews (Doutrich & Story, 2004; Fitzgerald, Williamson, Russell, & Manor, 2005; Johnston & Herzig, 2006), and the collection of narrative data, such as audiotaped reflective discussions about cross-cultural encounters (Doutrich & Story, 2004) and the use of narrative interviews (Taylor, Gambourg, Rivera, & Laureano, 2006).
However, while cultural competence has gained use and credibility among a broad range of professions during the past two decades, it also has been criticized as relying on vague definitions and inconsistent empirical measures, and missing important perspectives of the so-called “Other” (Herman, Tucker, Ferdinand, Mirsu-Paun, Hasan, & Beato, 2007; Kocarek, Talbot, Batka, & Anderson, 2001). Scholars from the fields of social work and psychology have maintained that cultural competence has not been conceptualized to address the important issues of oppression and social injustice (Dean, 2001) or considerations of power and positionality of those involved in the cultural competence dynamic (Suzuki, McRae, & Short, 2001). In addition, the concept thus far has been measured mainly through quantitative assessments, usually through surveys of professionals before and after they have undergone cultural competence training.
Some scholars argue that the concepts of culture and cultural competence are complicated in nature and best assessed solely through qualitative means (Johnston & Herzig, 2006). Anthropologists in particular have criticized cultural competence as essentializing the multifaceted nature of culture, with some calling the concept a “backdoor to racism”(Lee & Farrell, 2006). Culture, according to anthropologists, is historically situated, de-territorialized, and continually evolving due to internal and external influences. It also should be broadly defined and related to the ways in which people and communities make meaning in their lives (Geertz, 1973; Rosaldo, 1989/1993).
This study seeks to answer whether and how journalists can better understand and represent various cultural perspectives in the news and potentially promote understanding about these perspectives by becoming more culturally competent. To address criticisms of cultural competence and to tailor the concept for journalists, expanded conceptual and operational definitions of cultural competence were created for this study. Due to the complex nature of culture noted by anthropologists, the conceptualization of cultural competence used in the research is based on a culturally competent approach to journalism and the position of a journalist along a continuum of cultural competence, as discussed by Cross, Bazron, Dennis, and Isaacs (1989), rather than determining whether a reporter “is” or “is not” culturally competent.
In addition, the study conceptualizes culture, located within the knowledge dimension of cultural competence, as a multifaceted notion that includes “macro” aspects involving cultural practices that conform to common codes and norms; shared language; and common historical, political, social, and economic development. It also includes anti-essentialized “micro” aspects, such as internal contradictions and inconsistencies, continual change due to internal and external influences, and the multiple identities of individuals within the culture. An understanding of the macro aspects of culture provides a generalized context for the culture, while the micro aspects reveal the reality on the ground, so to speak, meaning the contradictions and complexities inherent in any human activity. A culturally competent journalist would develop an understanding of “macro” and “micro” aspects of a culture and have the ability to convey those aspects of culture to a mass media audience.
The dimensions of awareness and skills developed by Sue et al. (1992) also were used in the operationalization of cultural competence of journalists. For journalists, awareness would involve being cognizant of one’s socially constructed and individual cultural perspectives and biases. The awareness dimension also would include mindfulness of potential power issues between sources and journalists, in that journalists ultimately control the content of news texts. A culturally competent journalist would be willing to relinquish some degree of control over news texts to sources, such as not interrupting sources during interviews, using lengthy and accurate quotations by news sources, and incorporating into texts numerous audio and video clips with sources speaking with their own voices. They also would be aware of the complexities involved in intercultural communication, using culturally sensitive language, challenging stereotypes and not being hesitant to approach news sources from different cultures.
The skills dimension of cultural competence for journalists would involve a myriad of skills to interact effectively and appropriately with culturally different “Others,” such as communicating effectively and appropriately, creating news texts that avoid stereotypes, and providing context for the way people make sense of their lives by covering a broad array of perspectives and issues related to a particular culture. Being comfortable, open to different perspectives, flexible, empathetic and respectful with others also are important attributes and skills for journalists, particularly those who are reporting on culturally diverse communities.
METHOD
This study attempts to refine the definition and measures of cultural competence, applying the concept through a textual analysis of the multimedia news texts of student journalists reporting on inner-city communities.The research is part of an extensive case study of a multimedia urban reporting lab in which undergraduate student journalists produced multimedia news and feature stories about urban communities in a large northeastern city. An important aspect of the study and the focus of this article is a close examination of the student journalists’ news texts as they relate to cultural competence. The close examination was conducted through a textual analysis of the students’ multimedia news texts, supported by in-depth interviews with the students’ news sources and community representatives about the reporting and news texts. The operational definition of cultural competence developed for this study was used as a basis for the analysis.
The texts of two student groups working in the multimedia urban reporting laboratory as part of their university coursework were identified for the textual analysis. The two groups of student reporters covered the same issue in the same neighborhood – the sale, use, and abuse of illegal drugs. Each reporting group was made up of three student journalists; one group produced texts about the neighborhood during the Spring 2008 university semester and the other covered the same community during the Summer 2008 semester. The students’ multimedia news packages about the neighborhood were posted on a course website and included written text articles, videos, audio news packages, photographs, and photo galleries.
In a textual analysis, the researcher attempts to “make an educated guess at some of the most likely interpretations that might be made of that text” (McKee, 2003, p. 1). In addition to likely interpretations of the students’ texts, evidence of culturally competent awareness, knowledge, and skills was sought within the texts. Other important aspects of assessing the cultural competence of the news coverage included evaluating whether the students were able to represent the complexities of life in the neighborhood and determining the potential meanings that could be generated from the texts.
The neighborhood the students covered is considered part of so-called “Badlands” and is the home to the city’s number one drug-selling corner (Volk, 2007, 2011). The sale of illegal drugs, particularly heroin and cocaine, has created a hub of economic activity in the neighborhood that cannot be matched anywhere else in the community. A local newspaper article quoted a university sociologist as saying that narcotics are the “major employer” in the neighborhood (Volk, 2007).
The sale and use of drugs in the neighborhood also can be considered similar to the conceptualization of “inner-city street culture” by anthropologist Philippe Bourgois, who defined street culture as: “a complex and conflictual web of beliefs, symbols, modes of interaction, values, and ideologies that have emerged in opposition to exclusion from mainstream society” (1996/2003, p. 8). This study argues that the sale and use of drugs in the neighborhood examined in this study represents a “culture” according to the way that culture is conceptualized in this study, using anthropologists’ Clifford Geertz’s definition of culture, which involves “webs of significance,” (1973, p. 5) as well as Renato Rosaldo’s conceptualization of culture as the way in which people “make sense of their lives” (1989/1993, p. 26). What follows is an analysis of how the student reporters in the two groups covered the neighborhood’s drug culture in their news texts.
RESULTS
The first group, the Summer 2008 student group, covered the neighborhood during a six-week summer session at the university in May and June 2008. This group consisted of three students who were 22 to 23 years of age. One student was an African-American woman, who will be called “Sharon,” and the others were two men, one white man, who will be called “George,” and one mixed-race of Irish and Puerto Rican descent, who will be called “Ryan.” All reported that they had grown up in middle-class, suburban areas of 30,000 people or less, with residential populations that were somewhat ethnically diverse; all had grown up approximately within a 75-mile radius of the city in which the university was located. Sharon was majoring in the broadcast journalism sequence; Ryan was in the magazine sequence, and George was in the news-editorial sequence.
Summer 2008 Group: “The Corner That Cares”
The Summer 2008 group produced several multimedia pieces as assigned during the semester. This analysis examines the students’ final multimedia package, which focused on local services for drug-addicted people. The multimedia package was titled “The Neighborhood Corner That Cares.” One text featured a 5:47 video called “The Saving Corner,” about three social service organizations located around one corner of the neighborhood. One of the organizations provides Christian-based ministry for addicts by a local pastor who is a former drug addict; another is a food kitchen run by a local Catholic organization; and the third is a 12 Step recovery house, which runs programs for addicted people and provides apartments for homeless addicted people. The students’ video features interviews with the pastor at the service agency, the priest who directs the food kitchen, and workers and addicts at the recovery house including recovering drug addicts who now live or work there. Accompanying the video was a written, print-style article, “The Last Stop is Always the Hardest,” about the 12-Step recovery house and the apartments it provides next door for homeless addicts. The article describes the recovery clubhouse and the apartment building, and it includes quotes from some of the former addicts who have received services. Most of those same quotes also were featured in the video.
The recovery house and stories of former addicts are part of the “web” of the neighborhood’s drug culture. An analysis of the news pieces showed that the student reporters demonstrated aspects of a culturally competent approach to their coverage relative to the community’s drug culture. For example, the students’ news texts revealed an understanding of little known, nuanced, “micro” aspects of the drug culture. In “The Saving Corner” video package, multiple voices and perspectives of recovering addicts were heard, revealing their struggles with addiction and the help they had received in the recovery house. The reporters also were covering an issue of significance in the neighborhood, which indicates a “micro” level of knowledge of the community and its priorities. Thus, the students’ texts had the potential to transmit some knowledge of the culturally different “Other” to their audiences.
Another indication of knowledge of the Other in the group’s news texts was that the student reporters were able to represent some of the complexities of life in the “web” of the drug culture, according to interviews with news sources and neighborhood representatives. One news source said in an interview that the video in particular represented the reality of life for an addict, and he noted that audiences “need to hear about both sides. They need to see the struggle everybody came out of and where they are at now, versus where they were before…It gave it a good point of view of reality.”
One reason the student reporters were able to provide a representative account was because they featured recovering drug addicts telling their own stories. The students extensively used the former addicts’ own voices, particularly in the video, and allowed the sources to speak for extended periods of time without interruption. During the interviews, the camera held on people’s faces for extended periods of time, with few edits. The lack of interruption and amount of time the students provided for the subjects to tell their stories demonstrated empathy and respect for the recovering addicts, both of which are skills and attributes associated with cultural competence. In addition, even though the stories addressed common mainstream news media storylines about the community – drugs in the so-called “Badlands” – the student reporters produced alternative storylines by focusing on solutions to the problem such as services for addicts and other people in need. This approach contrasts with the city’s mainstream media’s coverage of the community, which tended to focus on crime and law-and-order themes.
The nature of multimedia storytelling was highly contextual. Photographs, audio packages, and videos used in multimedia storytelling take the audience to a particular location and allow people to tell their stories in their own words. Having people speaking in their own voices – rather than solely mediated through a reporter’s notes and texts – not only shifted some of the control of the narrative in the residents’ direction, but it also allowed the audience to come to know local residents. But while the student reporters in the Summer 2008 group interviewed a number of people and featured them speaking in their own voices and within their own context, they did not harness the full contextual potential of multimedia storytelling. The written article that was located below the video on the students’ web page for the course used the same interviews and same information as “The Saving Corner” video. The news article provided no new information for the audience about the recovery house and addicts’ lives. Also, there were technical problems revealed in shaky camera shots and quick cuts in the video; one interview was conducted in an environment so noisy that the speaker could not be heard. These technical issues have the potential to lower the credibility of both the reporters and the piece.
The textual analysis of the students’ news package also revealed that one reporter’s perspectives came through in the written article about the recovery house. For example, the article described the black-colored door of the apartment building for homeless addicts as looking “like it could lead to another dimension.” It is not clear what dimension the reporter was referring to, but the representation reflects the reporter’s perspective and would not necessarily be shared by others. A more culturally competent approach to reporting would be for the student journalist to be aware of his own perceptions and attempt to learn other perspectives, such as finding out about the meaning of the black door from the individuals who live in the building and local residents who live nearby. The reporter also wrote that after entering the apartment building, “it is easy to see that what its residents call an apartment looks more like a jail.” Again, the residents refer to the place as an “apartment,” yet the reporter writes that it is “more like a jail” – another reference to the way the reporter makes sense of the world rather than the individuals he is writing about. The text goes on to state that life in the building is “almost like living in primitive times…in the sense that entertainment and technology are non-existent.” Once again, the reporter’s socially constructed way of making sense of the world – that life without entertainment or technology is “primitive” – could be viewed differently by those who have other perspectives. The text also does not demonstrate empathy for the lives of people in the community. In this case, dimensions of cultural competence such as awareness of one’s biases, knowledge of the Other, and the skills of being empathic and open to different perspectives do not appear evident.
In addition, alternative voices relative to the services available in the community were missing in the video package, according to interviews with the news sources. One news source said he wished the student reporters had talked with people who go to the food kitchen to “help people understand that people don’t really choose to live here. A lot of middle-class people think that they just don’t want to get a job and they are lazy.” Thus, while the multiple perspectives were provided regarding recovering addicts at the 12 Step recovery house, the perspectives of other local people who need the food services featured in the video were not provided.
Little “macro” information was provided within the students’ news texts, indicating a lack of cultural competence. One of Ryan’s course-related blog postings provided some neighborhood history about manufacturing jobs leaving the neighborhood, which helped to pave the way for an economy based on the sale of illegal drugs, but this information was not included in the video package or the text article. The blog post stated that the loss of manufacturing jobs in the neighborhood left a “void of business (and) created a hub for drugs, especially heroin.” Inclusion of this important contextual information would have made for a more culturally competent “The Corner That Cares” text.
Another way the students could have provided more context and “macro” information in their pieces on recovery from drug addiction would have been to dig deeper into the “whys” of addiction. According to one news source:
They only view their present condition and the present condition that they are in. I don’t think they dig enough to try to ask the questions of why. I think if they ask that question, they will find out why, you know, sexual abuse has driven some of these girls to, not just to their addiction, but also to the prostitution, to support it and to numb their pain.
As Hall (1997) noted, meaning in texts is based on the symbolic function of the word, photo or electronic transmission; this tells us what the text stands for. “The Corner That Cares” multimedia text features the food kitchen and services for drug addicts, and includes interviews with addicts who talk of their struggles with drugs. The main message seems to be: These people need help. While this representation of the culture is a compassionate one, this representation – coupled with some of the language used in the text article about the apartment building seeming “primitive,” within “another dimension,” and like a “jail” – also is a limited one and indicates “exoticizing” of the recovered addicts. This multimedia package included factors that both contributed to and hindered the level of cultural competence in the texts.
Spring 2008 Group: “War on Drugs”
This section analyzes a multimedia package about drug addiction and sales in the same community produced by the second student group working in the neighborhood. This student group was made up of three female journalism majors, all 21 to 22 years of age. In this case, one of the students (“Maya”) grew up in the neighborhood and still lived there at the time she was reporting on it. She was majoring in the broadcast journalism sequence and the other two were in the magazine sequence. Maya and another student, “Susan,” were of Asian descent, and one, “Joanne,” was white. Susan, who was of Korean descent and had been adopted by a white family, grew up in an upper-middle-class suburban county that was contiguous with the city. Joanne grew up in a middle-class, suburban community about 95 miles away from the university. Maya, who was of Vietnamese descent, had lived in the neighborhood since the age of three. In contrast to the previous group, which covered the neighborhood during the condensed six-week summer period, the students in this group were working in the neighborhood during a typical 15-week semester.
The group’s text analyzed in this study also focused on the students’ final project about drug addiction and sales in the community. Like the text produced by the other student group, elements of the multimedia piece represented aspects of the “web” of the local drug culture. The multimedia piece included: a photo gallery with captions that led viewers through different drug-related aspects of the neighborhood, such as the railroad tracks where addicts shoot up and garbage cans that act as stashes for drugs; a text article providing the economic history of the neighborhood and discussing how drug sales have become the new economy; and a series of two- to three-minute videos, including one set of a “drug tour” of the neighborhood, another set that featured “Voices” links of interviews with local people in various stages of addiction, a video news package about a needle exchange program in the area, and a video of a local community activist rapping about the local drug problems. Other links included blog postings in which the students wrote about their experiences reporting on the story, contact information for the sources, and email addresses for the reporters.
Several factors that contribute to cultural competence emerged from a textual analysis of the group’s texts. Some of the same indicators of cultural competence uncovered in the previous group’s stories also were demonstrated here, including that the texts reflected “micro” knowledge of the neighborhood by providing nuance and multiple perspectives and by addressing an issue that was important to local residents. In addition, as with the previous group, news sources interviewed said the texts represented the complexities of the drug culture in the neighborhood.
The Spring 2008 group also demonstrated several factors that contribute to culturally competent news coverage that were not reflected in the previous group’s stories. The texts revealed a deeper level of knowledge of the Other in the form of additional context about the community’s drug culture. For example, the texts included “micro” level information, such as the needle exchange program – a specific aspect of the neighborhood’s web and a concern for local residents – as well as “macro” level information, such as structural issues and the economic history and development of the neighborhood. Elements in the group’s multimedia text, including the photo and video drug “tour” of the neighborhood, emotional interviews with current and recovering drug addicts, and the article outlining the historical background and information about the socio-political development of the neighborhood, provided other “micro” and “macro” context needed to help audiences understand the extent of the drug problem in the neighborhood and its effect on local residents.
The “War on Drugs” stories indicated other factors that could be considered contributors to cultural competence. For example, like the first group, alternative storylines were offered. The texts included the voices of current and former drug addicts, as well the director of the needle exchange program and community residents who oppose the program because they say it litters area parks with needles and attracts addicts. The Spring 2008 coverage contrasts with the previous group’s drug services story, which did not include the perspectives of active addicts, of residents who oppose services for addicts in the community, or of others affected by the web of the drug culture in the community.
In addition, the students in the Spring 2008 group developed attributes and skills specific to knowledge of the Other and toward more cultural competence by clearly moving out of their comfort zone to report on the story. While the previous student group went to local organizations providing services for addicts, the students in this group went to drug corners to observe transactions, underneath railroad bridges where addicts shoot up heroin, to parks littered with needles, and to local businesses affected by the discarded needles. The active addicts were interviewed on the street.
A community organizer who acted as a guide on the “drug tour” for the Spring 2008 group said he has provided such tours for other journalists, including professional journalists, and took note that this student group went beyond the information he provided and found active and recovering addicts to interview. He said:
The stuff they did without us, interviewing the other people, that stuff was impressive to me because that’s really not easy to get…. It still takes a lot of courage to go and approach them and try to get them to open up like that. They don’t know… how they’re going to be perceived and there’s a very delicate thing about being a specimen. Nobody wants to be looked at like you’re coming down here to look at me ’cause I’m a freak. You know, like, no one likes that feeling, so you have to cross that barrier and make them feel like, you know, it’s all right.
The Spring 2008 group not only went out of their comfort zone to report the story, but the students also went beyond their primary news sources – the community organizers who took the group on a “drug tour” – in order to provide information to their audiences. The students presented their audience with additional “micro” knowledge with interviews with active addicts. And, while the community organizers provided a “macro” perspective by discussing the economic decline of the neighborhood, the students’ written article in the multimedia piece included additional “macro” information such as U.S. Census data providing the latest employment and economic statistics on the neighborhood.
In fact, the “War on Drugs” package demonstrated a great deal of “micro” and “macro” knowledge of the community’s drug culture. The students’ video and written news text discussed the historical and socio-political development of the community, as well as the roots of structural issues, in the form of economic and political deprivation in the urban neighborhoods relative to the suburban communities in which some of the students were raised. “Micro” knowledge also was evident in the students’ drug stories, where the texts were multi-vocal and interviewees were placed within their context: on the street, along a particular side-street that is falling into hands of drug dealers, at the drug corners, and in parks where used needles litter the grass. The interviews with addicts and local residents were often emotional and were shot in close-ups, drawing in the audience and almost making them a part of the story.
In addition, the blogs for the Spring 2008 reporters indicated awareness of self, a willingness to challenge or even change their own perspectives, and an inclination to remain open to the perspectives of community members. One blog described a student’s visit to a local Narcotics Anonymous meeting to learn more about addiction; another wrote that she came to realize the sale of drugs “wasn’t a business that only affects certain people. People of all ages and races were on that corner trying to make money to survive.” The students’ blogs also were open about the students’ experiences during the reporting process; the blogs revealed the students’ positionality and expressed a great deal of compassion the students felt toward the addicts and the people in the neighborhood. Joanne wrote in her blog that the drug tour was “one of the most eye-opening experiences I’ve had” in the city, later adding that she left the drug tour “with my eyes wide open with nothing to say,” while Maya – who observed recovery sessions in the same 12-Step house as the students in the other group – wrote twice in her blog that she wanted to cry over the drug addicts’ stories. This type of empathetic revelation and self-awareness was not evident in the previous group’s blogs.
Maya was the student who also was a resident of the community. Although Maya’s position in the web may be differently located compared with the other students because she and her family are affected as local residents, she still said she had had limited exposure to the culture and remains on its outer edges. Thus, while she could have been considered an “insider” as a resident of the neighborhood, she still was an “outsider” to the drug culture in the community. Interestingly, Maya was aware of her “outsider” status relative to the drug culture and arranged the tour with community organizers to learn more about the use of sales of drugs in the community. She was able to negotiate her “outsider” status by connecting with an “insider” to the culture she wanted to cover.
Returning to Hall’s (1997) notion of the meaning and symbolic function of texts, an examination of the “War on Drug” package showed that it attempted to draw in its audience with historical context, multiple perspectives from people in the neighborhood affected by drugs and the drug trade, closely shot interviews, a take-you-there tour of the neighborhood, and revelatory blogs. Even the title of the package, “War on Drugs,” while indicating a mainstream law-and-order storyline, also seemed designed to activate the audience. The meaning of the piece indicated “a call to arms” and implied that we all should do something about the drug problem in the neighborhood. This meaning reflects more of an “insider’s” perspective on the drug problem in the neighborhood because it attempts to make the issue a salient one for everyone to solve for the good of the neighborhood, versus a “situation” to be observed, with a certain amount of shock and surprise, from the outside. The reporters were able to cover more aspects of the drug culture’s webs of meaning, including its complexities, such as the desperation of the addicts and storeowners who no longer want to sweep up used needles in front of their shop. They also were able to penetrate the cultural web’s interior, and help the audience to understand more how people involved in the neighborhood’s drug culture make sense of the world.
IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS
The text in this study that indicated the more culturally competent approach to journalism was the “War on Drugs” package. The package’s videos, photo galleries and written article provided important “macro” historical context about the neighborhood such as how and why drugs became a major aspect of the area’s local economy, as well as “micro” information about what local residents are doing today to address the drug problem in the neighborhood. The “drug tour” video and photo gallery links gave audiences a chance to visit the neighborhood and see some of the devastation caused by the drug trade. A link called “Voices” featured video interviews with drug addicts discussing their situations in their own voices with very little editing or reporter interference. Another link navigated to the students’ blogs, which reflect awareness of their position in relation to their sources, their perspective on the drug issues in the neighborhood, as well as local contact information and the opportunity for audience interactivity. Reflecting on one’s interactions with those who have cultural perspectives different from one’s own is an important part of the process of cultural competence. Interestingly, the “War on Drugs” multimedia package continued to be featured on the lab’s website a year later. The other package was taken down from the website as additional content by the course’s students was posted.
The study uncovered a new factor that contributes to a culturally competent approach to journalism: negotiation of the complexity of an “insider” or “outsider” status. While most of the students reporting in the neighborhood were “outsiders” to the community, one student, Maya, had grown up there and was still living there with her parents. Yet, she was unaware of the extent of the use and sale of drugs within the community, thus was an “outsider” to this particular culture. Because she was aware of her “outsider” status on this issue, she and her fellow group members garnered the assistance of an “insider” guide to show them the nuances – or “micro” knowledge – associated with the community’s drug culture, such as drug stashes, sites where addicts used drugs, and the location of the busiest drug corner in the city. The other student group, meanwhile, produced texts that exoticized recovering addicts, which indicated an “outsider’s” perspective. The reporters were not able to negotiate their “outsider” status in the community and gain knowledge of the Other; they and their texts remained on the fringes of the cultural web.
The textual analysis also found that multimedia journalism provided a great deal of context for news stories, offering the potential to move journalists and their news texts toward a greater degree of cultural competence. This potential can only be realized if reporters utilize the potential of new multimedia journalistic practices, including using various media platforms to provide “macro” and “micro” context for news stories in a way that approaches what Geertz (1973) referred to as a “thicker description” of a particular culture. Harnessing the potential of multimedia would involve understanding how to best make use of the strengths and weaknesses each medium in order to produce an effective multimedia story. In order to provide a more culturally competent text, reporters also would allow news sources to speak for themselves in news stories, thereby shifting power through control of the narrative toward people in the community. While mainstream broadcast journalism can also feature video interviews, the norms and time constraints of the industry diminish journalists’ ability to air long-form and uninterrupted interviews. Web-based videos are less constrained by such norms.
In addition, the web allows journalists to produce texts such as blogs that demonstrate a high level of self-awareness of one’s cultural perspectives and biases and that increase the transparency of the reporting process. But while blogging has added a new dimension to the journalistic process, allowing reporters to move away from a strict journalistic voice and format and toward a more personal mode of communication with their audiences, reporters need to take care not to locate important factual information and context in their blogs while leaving them out of their news stories. Also, factors that seemed to diminish the level of cultural competence of the journalists’ texts included evidence of stereotyping or a reporter’s perspectives in news texts, missing perspectives about an important community issue, and technical problems that diminished the texts’ credibility.
The textual analysis also found additional factors to add to the operational definition of journalistic cultural competence developed for this study. Specifically, some of the factors that contributed to the cultural competence of the student journalists’ news stories included producing alternative storylines from the mainstream media in order to provide additional context about an issue of concern to the culture, and leaving one’s comfort zone to report multiple perspectives on an issue. In addition, the study showed that while it can be important to use “insider” sources to help negotiate one’s “insider/outsider” status, journalists need to go beyond those news sources to provide more complete context and culturally competent coverage. A revised operational definition of the cultural competence of journalists as it relates to their news texts is located in Table 1.
TABLE 1: REFINED OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF CULTURALLY COMPETENT NEWS TEXTS
Awareness
Knowledge
Skills
Production of news texts that demonstrate:Awareness of one’s own position and cultural perspectives and biasesAwareness of potential power issues associated with sources and journalists, including the use of lengthy and accurate quotations by news sources and use of a high level of use of audio and video clips with news sources speaking with their own voicesAwareness of the complexities involved in intercultural communication, including the use of culturally sensitive language when speaking to news sources and through the demonstration of dispositions associated with effective and appropriate intercultural communication including:little hesitation to approach news sources who are of a different culture;self-confidence, or the ability to approach news sources with relative ease;inquisitiveness, or asking numerous questions and listening to responses about the news source’s perspective;maturity, or being even-tempered and respectful in interactions with sources; andthe willingness to challenge stereotypes, understand one’s limits, and learn from their news sources
Production of news texts that demonstrate:Knowledge of the specifics of the “macro” aspects of particular cultures,such as knowledge of the cultures’ history; political, economic, and power relations; and certain beliefs and values, including religious beliefsKnowledge of the specifics of the “micro” aspects of particular cultures, such as the ability to produce alternative storylines from the mainstream media, include a wide range of diversity and type of (official versus nonofficial) sources and diverse range of news sources interviewed
Production of news texts that demonstrate:Attributes and skills that demonstrate empathy, respect and non-judgment of those culturally different “Others,” including open-mindedness and the ability to obtain and reflect multiple and diverse perspectivesProduction of news texts that represent the complexities of life in the cultureNonstereotypical language in news texts and level of contextualization of story in the form of background information on people or issue and use of photographs and videoProducing a wide variety of perspectives and stories and covering a broad array of issues related to one particular storyProducing alternative storylines from the mainstream mediaLeaving one’s comfort zone to report find multiple perspectivesDemonstrating awareness of one’s own cultural perspectives through blogsNegotiation of “insider” or “outsider” statusAbility to negotiate “insider” or “outsider” status as a journalist, such as having awareness of your status in the community and/orusing “insider” sources as a bridge to different culturesGoing beyond official or insider sources to gain informationHarnessing the potential of new multimedia journalistic practicesProviding macro and micro context for news stories using various media platforms and in a way that approaches “thicker description” of a particular culture; this includes an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of multimedia storytellingHaving news sources speak for themselves in news stories, thereby shifting power through control of the narrative toward the news sourcesProducing texts such as blogs that demonstrate a high level of self-awareness of one’s cultural perspectives and biases and that increase the transparency of the reporting processFew technical problems to reduce the credibility of the texts
A major implication from this research is that a culturally competent approach to journalism should become a topic of discussion in journalism courses. Awareness of self and knowledge of the Other, not just skills, should be taught and encouraged with the journalism students. With training and education in cultural competence, journalists can learn to become aware of their own social constructions and their individual perceptions related to their own schema and attributions. The result of increased cultural competence is the potentially for more representative news coverage of culturally diverse communities.
A limitation of this study is that it examined the news texts of only six student reporters. While the textual analysis is part of a larger, extensive case study of the multimedia lab and the texts were selected because the reporters covered the same issue in the same neighborhood, it is important to recognize that the sample size used in the study is small. The analysis should be considered part of an exploratory study that can inform community journalism, journalism education, and future research in this area. Some of the findings in this study deserve further research, including the potential of multimedia storytelling to increase understanding foraudiences about culturally different Others. The latter topic would involve audience reception research and would be best addressed in a separate study. Another important area of research would be the examination of cultural competence as it relates to reporting practices.
It is clear from the study’s findings that cultural competence is not only an appropriate concept to be applied to journalists and community journalism, but it also is an important one. The value of coverage that presents multiple cultural perspectives and increased understanding for audiences cannot be underestimated. In our increasingly interconnected world, there can be no better goal for the journalism profession today.
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About the Author
Dianne M. Garyantes, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of journalism at Rowan University.
