comm207fall06

"I don’t think that we are going to have such a salutary view of what happened in the Clinton presidency. Clinton’s transgressions have little in common with Watergate, which was about a vast and pervasive abuse of power by a criminal president, who ordered break-ins and firebombings, who impeded the free electoral process, who instituted illegal wiretaps and used the Internal Revenue Service as a force for personal retribution...

I was talking about, about what we do. The rise of idiot culture, which we must resist, is taking place at a time when other institutions in this society, particularly our political institutions, particularly the American Congress, have been failing us, pandering even more shamefully to polls instead of engaging in problem-solving; responding to campaign contributions instead of to the real problems, fears, needs of the people of the country; surrendering too often to demagoguery and irrelevance instead of leading the people"

Berstein is a very 'real' reporter. He speaks on the things that Elite America runs from. Berstein talked about context. I believe that context in this sense deals with 'the given'.

Also cross-posted to my other mass communications student blogs. Your assignment -- to write a head for the Carl Bernstein speech linked below -- is in boldface type at the bottom of this page. -- pe

Carl Bernstein, one of the reporters who broke the Watergate story during the 1970s, has a definition that I've liked ever since I first came across it in our copyediting textbook, Modern News Editing by Mark Ludwig and Gene Gilmore (5th ed. Ames, Iowa: Blackwell, 2005). Journalism, according to Bernstein, is "the best obtainable version of the truth" (231). Ludwig and Gilmore add it's "an acknowledgement that the full truth is hard to grab hold of and may shift over time as more facts are revealed."

Turns out Bernstein has been saying it for years. Especially after he and fellow Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward were portrayed in the Hollywood movie "All the President's Men" (1976), Bernstein has been a fixture on the rubber-chicken dinner and lecture circuit. And he gives this definition of journalism to audience after audience. Usually he says it's being undermined by celebrity news and cost-cutting in U.S. newsrooms.

It makes sense to me. I think it makes sense to a lot of people who have covered the news, and who know from the experience how elusive the truth can be. I like it because it doesn't promise too much. It doesn't promise The Truth with a capital "T."

"Truth is the word that summarizes many journalistic ideas," say Ludwig and Gilmore. "But what, philosopy has always asked, is Truth? Working newsmen and newswomen know what truth means on the job and don't worry too much about the big picture, so far as they can discover and portray it." The best obtainable version, in other words, of truth.

Ironically, Bernstein credits Woodward with the phrase. When the two were interviewed by Larry King of CNN, they said:

... it -- but it -- it -- you know, and our concern is that -- and Carl makes this point, and it's a critical one, that the business of this kind of journalism, trying to get to the bottom of something complicated, hidden, scandalous, or important decisions by people who have lots of power, involves lots of sources. Not one source, not 10, but dozens or even hundreds.

BERNSTEIN: You know, Bob said right after Watergate, that really, what this story was about, like all reporting, or good reporting, is the best obtainable version of the truth. And that phrase has always stuck with me about what real reporting is. When we did "All the President's Men," it turned out unintentionally it was maybe a primer on the basic kind of police reporting and slogging and knocking on doors.

They went on from there, on Larry King Live. But for me the best obtainable version of truth has something to do with "the basic kind of police reporting and slogging and knocking on doors."

In seeking the best obtainable truth, Ludwig and Gilmore look for several things.

The most important is accuracy. "Newsrooms rightly develop a fixation on accuracy about names and addresses. But reporters must be at least as careful about accurate quotation, or about the accuracy of the impression that results from the way facts are put together."

Almost as important is objectivity. Ludwig and Gilmore cite the conventional wisdom: "Reporters should keep themselves out of the story, and editors should see that they do."

Closely related to accuracy and objectivity is fairness. Ludwig and Gilmore have a simple standard for editors: "They treat everybody alike."

Bernstein's rubber-chicken dinner speech, as he gave it Sept. 26, 1998, at the annual convention of the Radio and Television News Directors Association, is available on line. In it he says:

The truth is often complex, very complex. “The best obtainable version of the truth” is partly about context and this is perhaps the greatest single failing of our journalism in media today. For too much of it is utterly without context. Facts by themselves are not necessarily the truth. Thus the gossip press, the tabloids, too much of what we see on the air, even when the facts are somewhat straight, they are often a form of misinformation, because their aim is to shock, to titillate, to distort, to give grotesque emphasis.

How did journalists in the good old days -- which happen to coincide with Bernstein's reporting days -- find the best obtainable version? Bernstein suggests they looked for "thoroughness, for accuracy, for context." Hard to do, he adds, when an "idiot culture" demands 24/7 coverage of celebrities and political foodfights:

The hunger for gossip and trash and simple answers to tough questions in our culture today is ravenous and the interest in real truth, hard, difficult, complex truth, that requires hard work, digging, reporting, is waning In America our political system, and I think we are seeing it now, has been failing and with its failure we have been witnessing as well a breakdown of the comity and the community and the civility, that has traditionally allowed our political discourse to evolve. The advent of the talk show nation, not just on radio, but on television especially, with its standards of the grotesque and people screaming mindlessly at each other on the air is part of this breakdown.

Does Bernstein overdo his critique? Probably. But does he have a point there? Probably. His speech has been covered by the Lawrence (Kan.) Journal-World and the Daily Texan, student paper at the University of Texas in Austin, among others.

In class, read the speech and look at both the Kansas and Texas write-ups of it. Then write your own headline. Let's make it a 2-36-2 for the sake of variety. How many columns is that. What's the type size? How many points? How many lines? (We used to call them "decks," my wife reminds me, at The Rock Island Argus. Same thing. Different word for it.)

We've looked at a speech by Carl Bernstein, who covered the Watergate story for The Washington Post and is now an editor at Vanity Fair, on the state of the news business. Here's another. It's by David Leigh, an assistant editor of the Guardian in London, with special responsibility for investigative reporting. His headline sums up the tone of the speech: "Are reporters doomed?" His answer. Read it for yourself and make your own conclusion. But I'd say his answer is yes, probably.

But you can write a better head than that. Right? Make it a 1-36-4. That looks like a fun challenge. How many columns is that? How big is the type (in points)? How many lines?

Says Leigh:

I fear that these developments [various forms of online publication and blogging] will endanger the role of the reporter. Of course, there will always be a need for news bunnies who can dash in front of a camera and breathlessly describe a lorry crash, or bash out a press release in 10 minutes. There will probably be a lot more news bunnies in the future. There will probably also be hyper-local sites — postcode journalism fuelled cheaply by neighbourhood bloggers. But not proper reporters.

You probably figured out how to translate from the British yourself. But a "lorry" is a truck, and British "postcodes" are like our ZIP codes. "News bunnies" needs no translation.

A copy of an email message I sent out this morning to students registered for Communications 393. I'm posting it to my blogs for communications students as well. I have great respect for the Benedictine/SCI grapevine, and I'll appreciate your assistance in getting the word out. -- pe.

A reminder: The end of the semester is only a month away, so it's time to pull together the material for your senior portfolios.

I will need to meet with each of you in order to: (1) inspect your professional portfolio; and (2) receive a Senior Portfolio Folder containing your self-reflective paper and copies of four pieces of work (artifacts) you have done for class, for internships and/or off-campus publications. You will keep your professional portfolio for use in job hunting, but Benedictine University will retain a Senior Portfolio Folder from each student for program assessment purposes.

I am developing a more detailed set of instructions, which I hope to email to you over the weekend, but I wanted to send out this reminder so you can get started how.

THERE ARE THREE parts to the Senior Portfolio procedure:

I. SELF-REFLECTIVE ESSAY. To be turned in, as part of the Senior Portfolio Folder, during a conference with me before the end of the semester.

The self-reflective essay will be 10 to 12 pages in length, in which you reflect on your experience as a communications major at Benedictine in terms of: (a) your progress toward developing or furthering your career goals; (b) your understanding of the profession, its ethics and its role in society. In this essay you should address the following program objectives of Benedictine's mass communications department:

1. Prepare graduates for careers in advertising, electronic and print media, journalism, public relations, publishing, writing or other careers requiring sophisticated communications skills;

2. Prepare graduates for continued study in graduate or professional school;

3. Develop the student's critical and imaginative thinking, reading and writing skills;

4. Develop skills to empower the student to communicate ideas effectively, through speaking, writing and the use of technology;

5. Develop skills for critical interpretation of the media;

6. Foster aesthetic understanding in both production and interpretation of media texts;

7. Develop knowledge of the methods to make responsible social and personal decisions;

8. Develop primary and secondary research methodologies;

9. Develop an understanding of the history, structure and operation of the mass media;

10. Provide an understanding of the impact of mass media industries and messages on the individual, society and culture;

11. Develop professional-level skills in written and oral communication for a variety of media and audiences;

12. Develop professional-level production skills for both print and electronic media;

13. Encourage the development of creative expression; and

14. Help the student develop a professional media portfolio.

II. PROFESSIONAL PORTFOLIO. To be inspected by me during our end-of-semester conference and returned to you. This will be a collection of your best work, preferably gathered in a presentation folder, that you can take with you on job interviews.

III. SENIOR PORTFOLIO FOLDER. To be turned in to me during our end-of-semester conference and retained by Benedictine. Since we will keep these folders, I will accept them in an inexpensive pocketed folder; you can find them in an office supply store or the school supplies aisle of most drug stores. In this folder, you will include: (a) the the self-reflective essay; and (b) at least one copy at least one piece of work (artifact) from each of the following categories:

1. A 300-level research paper written for a 300-level theory class (including COMM 317, 385, 386, 387, or 390, and 391 if it is a theory class). It must contain proper annotation, structure, evidence, and methodology. The student must have attained a grade of at least a “B” on the paper in its original form for it to be accepted for this requirement.

2. A print-based publication, defined as an original written or produced work fixed in a printed and published medium (including newspapers, magazines and newsletters). If you do not have print publication credits, class work for COMM 207, 208, 209, 253 (equivalent to SCI's COM 221), 254, 263 (equivalent to SCI's COM 222), 264, 337, 381 or 382 can be accepted.

3. A web-based publication, i.e. creation that has been exhibited on the World Wide Web and is created for a departmental publication, internship, or work-related experience. The Sleepy Weasel counts as a web-based publication. Any other web-based artifact, including blogs or personal Web pages, must be approved by the instructor prior to the submission of the full portfolio.

4. Brochures, fliers, memos or other work product, including advertisements, pamphlets, brochures, letterheads, scripts or other copy prepared for broadcast, memos, creative briefs, campaign plans or other tangible material written in connection with a college course or an internship.

I will send you a formal assignment sheet in a few days, and there is more detail available about the senior portfolios on the COMM 393 syllabus linked to my faculty page at http://www.sci.edu/classes/ellertsen/masscom/comm393syllabus.html

If you have any questions or comments, please don't hesitate to get in touch with me.

-- Pete "Doc" Ellertsen, instructor

These articles let me see that reporters will risk their lives for a good report. Just judging for the bloggs that were posted during the storm, I can really see, throught the way the writing was chopped-up, that the reporters were very scared. They were trying to cover as much information as fast as they could. There was a lot of uncertainty about everything. They posted the emergency contacts before the phones went out. They were not concerned about gramatical errors.

Cross-posted to my mass communications blogs. -- pe

There's a story in yesterday's Washington Post that we need to read, even though it relates to material we covered earlier in the semester and/or will come back to at semester's end. It's a column by media critic Howard Kurtz on right- and left-wing perceptions of bias in the news media. To sum it up briefly, maybe a little too briefly, Kurtz thinks the media are taking fire from both sides. And he implies, without coming right out and saying it, that's about where you want to be if you're covering the news.

Kurtz has been on the talk show circuit plugging his book on network news, and he said the talk show hosts "appear to be living in parallel universes." His column is a good overview of the issue, concluding:

Bobbing along on this swirling sea of opinions, I became increasingly convinced there is a place for newscasts that at least attempt to provide viewers with a straight set of facts. To be sure, these programs make subjective judgments, sometimes miss the boat and appeal to a demographic keenly interested in all those segments on back pain and hip replacements. But it would be a shame if, in an age of infotainment, the new generation of anchors can't find ways to keep their broadcasts vital as well as balanced. Without them, after all, there would be fewer targets for "The Daily Show" to mock.

Read it. Might be a good one to print out for later use, in fact. I don't know how long The Post archives its stories on the open website.