What I’m Reading
May 4, 2022
What I’m Reading returns with a radio segment on the impact of pictures about the war in Ukraine, an introduction to a photography project that offers an honest look at suburban Paris, and a read that stimulates thinking about bias in journalism.
The Power of Pictures
The first read today is a four-minute listen from NPR. The topic is graphic and so are some of the descriptions. But I find it an essential read/listen about the war in Ukraine, for it highlights the need for an independent press and the influence journalism can have.
“Veteran war photographer David Hume Kennerly reflects on the impact of his craft” is a great discussion about the impact of the pictures that we’re seeing from Ukraine. Instead of using up more lines here, I recommend you just spend the four minutes. If you care to digest this issue a bit deeper, here’s the link to Kennerly’s op-ed in The New York Times the host mentioned.
Before I move to the second recommendation, here’s the quote I found the most important: “Pictures fly over the head of Russian disinformation specialists and right-wing pundits in America,” Kennerly said. “And they are a messenger directly from the field.”
Pictures at the Intersection of Art and Reportage
For today’s final recommendation, I have something a bit different. “Beauty and Uprising in the Working-Class Suburbs of Paris,” is an introduction to the work of photographer Mohamed Bourouissa, specifically, his work from the streets of Paris’s banlieues, the working-class Parisian suburbs that rose to tragic international recognition in the violent riots in the fall of 2005.
Tausif Noor, for The New Yorker, introduces and discusses Bourouissa’s work, recently published in book form for the first time.
The 2005 violence sparked the artist’s interest. He started meeting people, spending time in the neighborhoods and eventually photographing. Noor goes more in-depth on the photographer’s technique and the effects on the pictures and their audience. I’ll leave those discoveries for your own time with the article.
There’s also a good selection of pictures that provide you with a window into working-class Paris.
I found my time with those pictures interesting. It’s not photojournalism. The pictures are staged and directed. It’s art, not journalism. Yet, they still offer an important look that stands in contrast to the journalistic representation of the banlieues and their residents; a different perspective.
Of Twitter & Journalistic Decision-Making
For today’s final recommendation, I send you again to Harvard’s media research institution Nieman Lab. “Yes, journalists show more (cognitive) bias on Twitter” offers insights into journalistic decision-making processes and their impact on potential biases in the news.
Mark Coddington and Seth Lewis first outline the two modes in which humans make decisions: quicker decisions, which are based on emotions, habits, and prior experiences vs. slower, more deliberate thought processes that include more analytical thinking.
Not surprisingly, the first is more susceptible to our own biases.
Journalistic decision-making has been studied for a while. The writers here link to a study from 1989 about the influences on journalists and their decisions. And they use a new study that looks at what social media has changed about the coverage of the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign.
Read on for the details on the increase in quicker decision-making and how messages on Twitter differ from more polished articles.
It’s an interesting thought-stimulating read that leads us to the objectivity question. What does it mean to be objective as a journalist? Can there even be objectivity in the sense that there’s no influence by who we are?
No. The decisions on which stories to pursue, what’s newsworthy, what we find interesting, what we believe the audience finds valuable, how we want to approach a story, what information we want to include or exclude, are all influenced by the human behind the keyboard, camera, or microphone. Even if one takes great care to keep an open mind and evaluates as many angles as possible, being influenced by who we are is only human.
Objectivity means being open-minded, and being willing to think critically. It means one takes the time to learn about issues, analyze the information gathered, and represent the issue as fairly as possible.
I find pieces like these interesting readings that explain the mechanics of journalism and stimulate a better relationship between journalists and audiences.
Also, read the research roundup listed at the end for an equally fascinating look at the role of forgiveness in journalism and the effect corrections have on audiences.
Next week, I’ll have more reading recommendations from the world of journalism. And I’ll finally start that series on all things journalism, photography, and writing very soon.
