Should Journalists be reading or studying journalism?

There is so much that people, especially journalists have to live up to in this world and in their fields of expertise. Journalists strive for truthfulness, objectivity and giving quality information and news to the people. In this quest to be gatekeepers of society, journalists need to engage their investigate prowess to come up with news that is factual and fair.

 Journalism is about investigating, research and reporting on events that happen around the world, at any given time. These events could be anything from past incidents to current or more recent confrontations. Without written word, or compilations of past activities, it would certainly be a difficult for journalists to survive in the world. The world relies on history to reflect, aggregate, evaluate and correct our actions or motives in this world.

Journalists should always bear in mind that their audience is smarter than they think. There is always a chance that ordinary people in society know a lot or more than you do, thus the need to read expansively on different compilations and documents. This helps avoid the possibility of repetition or monotony in stories that people already know or stories that have been already covered by other media houses. Journalism in its own right is a competitive field. Media houses compete for audiences and want to expand their grip on their market, hence the competitive nature amongst the journalist themselves to get fresh, meaningful stories for the people every time.

 The only possible way of achieving such a mandate is to read and understand most of these things that have been laid down on paper. Reading is greatly important for journalists. It gives them a chance to put together different information, gathered by different authors or journalists, and come up with the perfect recipe that will help them to be better journalists.

We all learn from other people’s mistakes, at the same time using their experiences or flaws as guidelines in our own paths. Reading, therefore, equips journalists with skills that see them being servants of the citizenry and maintaining objectivity at all times. Objectivity ensures the continued readership and trust of media house or individuals who present their work the mass audience.

Although this is the case, I would love to believe journalism is understood better in the practice rather than in theory. For this reason that is why there are so many individuals who are thriving as independent entities or citizen journalists. These people do not have any qualifications or knowledge of how journalism in theory is, but they do have the skill to put news on people desks. They take upon themselves the duty to serve the audience, by simply utilizing media tools that help gather information.

These tools come in the form of mobile phones, digital cameras and other video recording devices. In this case, journalism thrives without research on past work or documents laid down by other authors or journalists. It springs up from being a natural instinct from ordinary citizens to put news out to the people, blossoming to become a hobby or part-time activity for some, or even a career for others.

Bhekimpilo Dungeni