Balanced Reporting

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Balanced Reporting

• Grocotts Policy for Today and Tomorrow

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Goals and Objectives

• To generate policy that will positively influence
  and direct reporting at Grocotts Mail
• An analysis of the media environment that
  Grocotts Mail exists within, with regard to
  Balanced Reporting.

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Balanced Reporting

• What is it?
• What is it not
• Challenges to Journalists
• The How
• Balance and Diversity

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Research

• Sampling
• Methodology
• Results a) Quantitative
  
  b) Qualitative

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Qualitative Data

• What are the needs of the people of the Makana
  Municipality, and do you think they are being
  fairly represented in Grocotts?
• Are you being represented. What do you want to
  see?
• Picture Quality?
• How do you feel about Temporary Staff?
• Rhodes owning part of paper?

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The HRC

• Investigation of allegations of racist reporting
  in the media
• Bad Newsroom diversity
• White top-down media ownership ensured people
  felt marginalised
• Gender lines meant woman at the bottom and
  controlled by men

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The HRC (cont.)

• Stereotypical racialisation of media subjects
• No plurality in media information
• Black lives were seen to be either tragic or
  threatening ... and less worthy then white lives
• Not deliberate use of stereotyping or
  racialisation ... but instead unconscious
  self-censorship from apartheid area

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The HRC (cont.)

• White paranoia about Black areas, resulting in
  black people doing 'black area' stories and
  then white people getting credit and by-line.

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Recommendations

• Ensure newsroom diversity through employment of a
  diverse range of gender, culture and racially
  different demographics
• Ensure that racism and racialisations don't enter
  the newsroom by being aware of terminology and
  focuses used

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Recommendations (cont.)

• Should create a balance between negative and
  positive stories
• Should have an active role and understanding in
  community development and issues
• Should ensure training and employment of local
  people so that local issues and the understanding
  of local issues goes beyond Rhodes students
• Should look into either creating a separate
  language publication, or incorporating languages
  into the publication.

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Recommendations (cont.)

• Submission only printing was problematic if
  medium is English so allow reporters to do Vox
  Pops to allow for different languages and
  illiterate people to have their say