Alternative journalisms through soundslides

WARD 10
Litha Mpondwana and Rachel Voigts

In terms of processes, we used Haas's "deliberating public" philosophy.  By this we mean that we understood the public as sharing a responsibility to debate issues in a public forum.  To this end, our group organised a public meeting.  This meeting introduced us to issues concerning the youth in ward 10 which we decided to follow up on.  We were taken aback by Newton's account of the obsticles the youth face in his community.  We decided to intervene by providing a platform for Newton to give his account to a wider audience.  We attempted to act as mediators between Newton and people who had the potential to help.  Using Haas a guide, we encouraged Newton to set the news agenda. 

While Haas's structure of public philosophy worked within our assignment, it did not satisfy every aspect of the assignment.  We found the need to integrate different kinds of journalisms to enhance Newton's story and increase its effectiveness towards its target audience.  Besides Haas's public journalism, we used advocacy journalism and development journalism. We used advocacy journalism by pushing an agenda - the agenda being the need for intervention.  We highlighted this need through Newton's emotional narrative and photos that showed the damaged facilities in the worst light.

Our goals were perhaps a bit optimistic.  We hoped to mobilise the youth in the area and solicit groups to intervene.  Unfortunately, while things are moving forward, the pace is slow and time is short.  With two weeks left to complete these assignments, it looks like we're still at base camp of Mount Kilimanjaro.  The most likely time to fulfill our aims would be if we were to embark on our goals at the start of next year.  That is the suggestion that we also received from the music department, who formed part of our target audience as people who could help.  So next year holds promise, but now we need people willing to continue the project we have started.

We indirectly played the watch-dog role by highlighting the shortcomings of the municipality.  We have also attempted to play a facilitative role by encouraging open discussion on the issues.  We used alternative methods of journalism by integrating different kinds of journalisms and by acting merely as a platform for Newton.

The process so far has been difficult due to time constraints, but has also been rewarding through our experiences interacting with the community.  The positive response from the music department also made it optimistically seem worthwhile as they have expressed interest in contributing to the community next year.  Our interaction with the community engagement officer at Rhodes University highlighted an obsticle the community needs to overcome in order to move forward.  Uniting the youth in the area and making them have similar goals to improve themselves is the most important task and perhaps beyond our ability to achieve.

The two of us originally had different takes on what journalism is.  The approaches and ideas we have been introduced to were not wholly new to both of us.  These are our accounts.
Litha: " I had many of the ideas incorporated into this course, in my journalistic philosophy already. I see the average citizen as the primary source of my journalism stories. I initially followed a development journalism approach, but this course introduced me to public journalism, which I have happily adopted into my philosophy. I enjoy interacting with the citizen, rather than being a distant observer."
Rachel: "I had a traditional preconception of what was involved in journalism.  The idea of intervening and participating in the community was new to me.  This project, especiallly working with Litha, gave me a fresh outlook on the journalist's role.  We both now see ourselves not simply as reporters but as facilitators of change."