Journalism within the audiovisual world - Lesson 3
Posted Oct 22, 2019 12:49 PM
This is lesson 3 of Journalism within the audiovisual worldJournalistic roles
You have different genres in journalism. Sometimes the journalist will make a short report of the hard news facts. In another case, the journalist wants to display an atmosphere. In an opinion story, the journalist gives his opinion. Journalistic genres are recognisable for the journalist and the reader. The journalistic genres are listed below:
News item
A news item is a current short article. It is informative and contains facts. A complete news item has been compiled based on the 5W1H questions. The 5W1H questions provide an answer to who, what, where, when, why and how. The message is written compactly and is in the present tense.
Background article
A background article is an informative article that goes into the background with the news. It is more extensive than a news item. A background story can emphasise the news from one or more perspectives.
Interview
An interview is an interview that shows the views of a person through a conversation between the interviewer and interviewee.
Opinion article
An opinion article is a convincing text in which a journalist expresses his or her opinion in a business-like way. An opinion article clearly shows the position of the journalist on the subject. Most newspapers have separate opinion pages.
Comment
The commentary shows the opinion of the news medium, for example, the newspaper. The editor-in-chief or the editor-in-chief often write it.
Profile or personal description
A profile or personal description is an article about a person. The reason for creating a profile or personal description is a news item about that person. This can be, for example, an appointment in politics, winning a medal or the death of a person.
Column
A column is a regularly published short article in which the columnist comments on a current topic in a personal way. Some columnists have a weekly fixed place in the newspaper. The column is often short, good, surprising and critical. This is possible with both a humorous and annoying writing style.
Cartoon
A cartoon is a cartoon, a humorous drawing sometimes in combination with a text about the news or current events in society.
Review
In a review, the journalist gives an opinion about a cultural activity or production. Reviews can be about anything that others make: books, concerts, theatre, CDs, exhibitions but also restaurants. A review contains both opinions and facts. Factual information is about the date and place of the performance, the price or the number of pages of a book, for example.
If you recognise the journalistic genres, you can also better interpret the content of the news.
The roles of a journalist
As a journalist, you can have different roles. This depends, among other things, on the genre in which you write. These roles are:
- Opinions: you stimulate discussions among citizens and politicians because you provide analysing articles with comments.
- Informing: where you report on social developments
- Check: check whether authorities and organisations comply with agreements and comply with their social responsibility
- Clarifying and analysing: providing background information on political and social events and commenting on this
- Scheduling: putting topics on the social agenda
- Analysing: you provide a substantive analysis on a specific question on which much information has already been published.
- Fun: you focus primarily on entertaining your reader.
Journalism as a watchdog for democracy
You can imagine that with all these different roles you can play a major role in society. This is certainly the case with your opinion role. It forces politicians, but also citizens or companies to take a position on something. That is why journalism is also seen as a watchdog for democracy. You cannot just go ahead in politics or in business, journalism informs the citizens of society about it. An example is the abolition of the dividend tax in 2018. This topic was not included in a single election program, and yet the government was appointed with great indignation.
Because news has such great social value, freedom of the press is anchored in the Dutch constitution. Journalists also have specific rights:
These are:
- to be allowed to publish secret material
- the source secret (keeping the sources of sensitive information secret if there are compelling reasons)
- extra protection against investigation and prosecution
Perspective
Good journalism is journalism that approaches a subject from multiple perspectives. You look at the same subject from different angles and weigh the meaning for different stakeholders.
It is said that the media landscape must be open and multiform. This means that it is clear how the working method is (open) and that those who make the news are a reflection of society. The latter is not the case everywhere in the Netherlands with regard to ethnicity. For that reason, some media companies are said to have "white" editors.
You can describe the same event from multiple angles. If an airport is coming then you can write this from the perspective of the neighbourhood residents (noise, air pollution) or the municipality (extra infrastructure needed or extra employment) or from the traveller (nice and close and more often on vacation).
How can journalism function properly?
You can imagine that there are countries in the world where it is difficult for journalists to practice their work. You need several preconditions to be able to exercise your journalistic work. These are:
- No censorship (no prior permission is required to spread thoughts or feelings). This is not self-evident everywhere in the world. Free press inimited, therefore, helps with projects to change that.
- No other legislation that impedes freedom of the press. This is a fundamental right in the Netherlands.
- Government not a dominant owner of news media
- A multitude of media that provide the news
- Predictable media legislation
- No legislation that makes news media unprofitable
- Access to public information
- The professional working attitude of the media
- Citizens must have access to a versatile range of news
Democracy and media
Democracy and the news media are inextricably linked. If a good news provision is missing, democracy will falter. On the other hand, journalism needs a democratic environment in order to work independently and professionally.
Whistleblowers
If you want to expose wrongdoing by bringing it out into the open via the media, you sometimes run risks. People who do this are called whistleblowers. She is not always thanked for the fact that they 'hang out the dirty laundry'. For example, read this article from the former pilot who felt that the security culture at the Ministry of Defense was not good.
To protect people if they fear the annoying consequences of whistleblowing, Publeaks has been established, an anonymous website where you can post messages that go directly to news editorial journalists. More than 50 tips were received in 2016, which led to 1 publication per week.
Journalistic agenda
In Dutch, you have a recurring pattern of events. Think, for example, of Prince's Day, World Women's Day or Peace Day. Journalists often create a news item that is linked to this special day and try to add current news value to such days. You call this: the journalistic agenda. It is already known in advance which days are coming, which you can find here. But also in your own region you know beforehand what is on the agenda, also think of local events, meetings due to elections and so on.
