The new media and new digital age that we are entering will require media professionals and citizens alike to rethink the way that news gets created and disseminated. I submit that the new technologies that have been created have made individuals creating news in a closed, static format obsolete. Instead news and therefore, information will be dynamic, open, cheap and widespread.

Clay Shirky’s book touches on some of the most important aspects of the new revolution. The book focuses on the social and cultural effects of the new media. It looks at how collective groups of people can influence and change the world. From his writing and ideas on groups, we can infer some things about how news is changing.

The dynamic nature of news is already here. In the past the paper was printed once or twice a day and that was the extent of the content. The live web is here and live news and information are with it. News is updated not only continually, but from mobile locations. Any person with a smart phone can produce information from wherever they are.

The dynamic nature of information is talked about in Shirky’s chapter on Wikipedia. He said that originally Jimmy Wales considered an expert only moderated article creation system, but that took too long and was cumbersome. Then, he let in the masses and the news and information was created with speed and increased quality. The collective action of many trumps the action of the few.

This dynamic and constantly updated change is also addressed in Shirky’s chapter detailing the publish then filter phenomena. This aspect could be a double edged sword for journalism. Content will be created, but quality and accuracy could be sacrificed. The free market of information would hopefully correct errors content, but that is yet to be seen on a mass scale. In looking at Wikipedia, the majority of content is accurate, but vandalism and questionable content still are published. That kind of vandalism and questionable content would be far less likely in the professional world of journalism.

Openness and new methods of sharing were talked about in Shirky’s chapter on collective action. The sharing of massive amounts of information is as easy as clicking the forward button on your e-mail. The ramifications for news will hopefully be higher quality content and verification. Having more eyes on a story would ideally lead to more corrections of inaccuracies by those who have information.

In the past, being a journalist was like a being given a special gift. A journalist was set apart from the average citizen and supposedly endowed with a special gift to inform the masses. Now, there is no distinction between news creators and consumers. Information and news creation is universal and cheap. In the future, being open with processes and news will not simply be an option, it will be the only way for trust to exist.

The cheap methods of content creation have made journalists no longer a set apart elite. This fact has and will continue to revolutionize media.  In chapter three, Shirky talked about how everyone is a media outlet. Today, people update their twitter statuses, facebook profile, flickr accounts, youtube accounts and more daily. This creates a lot of content. Of course, the vast majority of this content is low quality and meant for a tiny audience. Still, the mass individualized media outlets will require journalists to sift through them to find meaning and quality content, relevant to the masses.

Looking to developing parts of the world, this new media revolution is all the more important. In Shirk’s chapter on Flash Mobs, he talked about how instant protests have been seen in oppressive regimes. The same technology and ideas that form these instant protests can form to disseminate information and news about regimes, where technology or journalistic infrastructure is limited.

The access to news by the masses around the world and the amount of information available is revolutionary. There are trillions of websites on the internet. Wikipedia has more than 15 times the information than the Library of Congress. Broadband penetration and online access is spreading. This hyper information age that we are in has changed things. As Clay Shirky said, there has always been an information overload, but we just need better filtering methods. News needs to be synthesized and connections made by humans. Journalists can do that.

If I was to start up a new news organization, I would look to synthesize the points I have made into a practical standard operating procedure. This organization would share some resemblances to the past newsrooms. Of course, revenue would be needed and codes of ethics would be established,

The new model would be digital and lightweight, because as Jeff Jarvis so eloquently put, “atoms are a drag.” Investing millions in printing presses and the surrounding infrastructure would be unwise since innovation is to be expected and you cannot capitalize on innovation if you are tied to atoms and office buildings.

The organization would be humble. It would look to all sources for news and not put premiums on things like degrees or titles. News could come from sources that might not be expected. Looking at the people who are affected by news leads to truer content. Respecting what the masses of people say is a necessity.

The organization would iterate and flexible. Since I would not invest millions in hard infrastructure, new methods of content creation would be possible. Like David Cohn said, being able to fail is important to truly have innovative success.

The revenue that the organization would generate would be from several sources. It is no longer logical to expect people to pay more than a nominal fee for news. The generation that came to maturity with the internet is not going to pay a premium for information, just because it says the New York Times on the front.

Revenue could be generated by targeted ad sales. Using Google’s ad sense, ads could appear that are relevant to the individual consumer. It would be important that these ads are non-obtrusive. Having users pay a small monthly or yearly access fee would eliminate the ads.

If the site reaches a level that larger companies would want to advertise, it might be possible to do advertorials if the topic is deemed interesting enough and it is clear that it is sponsored. Digg, College Humor and other websites frequently have this type of content and it generates significant amounts of revenue.

The most important facet of any new news organization would be trust. Shirky talked about how trusting that our news and links are valid will make people willing to come back and willing to take a vested interest in the site. The trust and community have been and will continue to be the base for any type of news or journalistic adventure.

If a startup news companies followed those ideas, it would be profitable and high quality. New sites are emerging every day, so I am confident that new models of news will pop up. These new models will be unexpected but quality journalism will survive. There is no doubt that they will all be dynamic, open, cheap and widespread.

‘… by sleeping on it’

Os romances de mais alto conceito atualmente estão se encaminhando para um destino semelhante ao que aconteceu com a poesia, que foi colocada num pedestal tão alto, numa montanha tão alta, coberta de neve eterna, que todo mundo olha (de longe), mas ninguém vai lá em cima olhar (de perto). Algo semelhante vai acontecer com os romances, eles vão acabar sendo vistos, elogiados, mas não lidos.

Tom Wolfe, n’O Estado de S. Paulo desta quarta, 18.11.

+livros @ Papa

Uma penca de gente pagou uma grana pra ver o ícone do Novo Jornalismo, o jornalista e escritor americano Tom Wolfe. Pra quem não fechou o pacote completo do Fronteiras do Pensamento, tinha ingresso avulso hoje a 100 reais. E confesso, se eu fosse rica e tivesse dinheiro sobrando, eu teria pago os 100 pilinhas.

Ainda bem que não sou rica e não botei meu dinheiro fora. Fui de graça graças à professora Sandra de Deus, que cedeu convites à equipe do Jornalismo B. Decepcionante, no mínimo. Chata e sem noção também se aplicam à aula proferida por Tom Wolfe. A péssima tradução simultânea contribuiu para que a coisa não desse certo.

Ele falou de tudo, em um sem nexo absurdo. Os assuntos foram se intercalando inarticulados e sem motivo. Começou na crise econômica, passou por religião, arte, macacos, controle de natalidade, sexo, universidades americanas, Paris Hilton, genética. E pasme-se, não chegou em jornalismo e literatura. Falou até que Picasso e Matisse deveriam ter estudado arte por mais tempo para aprender a desenhar mãos.

E, por mais que o público insistisse, com uma pergunta atrás da outra – muito boas, por sinal – sobre o passado, o presente e o futuro do jornalismo, suas possibilidades criadoras, a linguagem literária, o jornalista tergiversava e inseria assuntos que nada tinham a ver.

E pior, o velhinho de terninho branco e meias xadrez – começo a desconfiar que ele é como a Mônica ou a guria da Uniban, que abrem o guarda-roupa e veem o mesmo vestido repetido diversas vezes – não só acrescentava informações desnecessárias. Ele simplesmente ignorava a pergunta.

No primeiro minuto da palestra, abri meu caderninho de anotações, saquei a caneta e preparei a máquina fotográfica. Tirei algumas fotos rapidamente, antes que ele falasse alguma coisa interessante que eu tivesse que parar para anotar. Imaginei que o início esquisito fosse apenas uma introdução que seria explicada pelas informações subsequentes. Insisti um pouco, mantendo a caneta destampada entre os dedos da mão direita e o caderno a postos na esquerda. Até que desisti. Guardei o caderno em branco.

———–

Um ótimo texto sobre o assunto está n’Os Estrangeiros. Vale inclusive a crítica ao preço do ingresso, à compra do saber e tudo o mais. E a reflexão sobre Tom Wolfe, evidentemente.

Sometimes, I confess, I buy the paper and I forget to actually read it. It will probably be the Guardian and I’ll buy it – promising myself that I will consume it lovingly cover to cover and that it will somehow make me a better person, raising my mind from thoughts of X Factor and lasagne. Such good intentions…

The next day I will see my paper on the sideboard. I will consider reading it but by now it looks deflated - its stories less enticing. I turn on the radio – the next episode of life and death is already happening somewhere out there. What is the point of paper pulp that only screams the breaking news of yesterday? So my paper ends up discarded and my money-waster guilt lives on. 

The characters in Thompson’s novel also face the question of the precise literary value and meaning of journalism. Well, I say face. They are journalists so they encounter the problem of writing reality but never fully discuss this issue in so many words and then, in most scenes, they get really drunk and sleep with other people or each other.

But Thompson’s narrator Paul Kemp carries around The Times like ‘a precious bundle of wisdom, a weighty assurance that [you're] not yet cut off from that part of the world that was real.’ Maybe, his character suggests, literature could learn some new tricks from the field of the hack. Get a bit more real. The alcoholic 60s cohort of ‘New Journalists’, including Thompson and his characters, try out a range of narrative and journalistic modes of writing in order to test out this theory.

Thompson, most famous for writing Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, paints a pretty debauched picture of Puerto Rico, its coin slots, fiestas, hotel parties and printing houses. Paul Kemp is portrayed as painfully aware he has only one drunken mind in a thousand with which to write reality. The Rum Diary stands as a record of a journalist-persona who writes reality ‘badly’ and offers us the job of doing better.

4/5 stars

Next I’m reading…Norman Mailer’s The Deer Park

Na próxima segunda-feira, o novojornalista Tom Wolfe será aplaudido de pé no Salão de Atos da UFRGS, em Porto Alegre. Nas primeiras filas, estarão pesquisadores de jornalismo, alguns lamentando que o salão não está completamente lotado, mas certos de que os caros bilhetes que deixaram na entrada os diferencia da ignorância e imaturidade que grassa sobre o resto da população porto-alegrense.  Ah, o doce fetiche da compra de conhecimento…

Mas enfim, devo parar de criticar a boiada e cuidar do meu próprio nariz – até porque, no meio dos que aplaudem surdos, sempre existem aqueles que não foram lá para serem ludibriados. Ou seja: não se pode generalizar. É que sei lá, fico agudamente triste de ver alguém como Tom Wolfe vindo falar em um conferência  destas, que poderia trazer tanta gente mais interessante – aaaah, por que não convidam o Gary Snyder para palestrar aqui antes que ele morra?

Depois de tanto pesquisar sobre Novo Jornalismo para minha monografia, constatei humildemente uma coisa: Wolfe é uma espécie de palavra divina quando se fala em Novo Jornalismo. Mas por que? Não sei, talvez porque ninguém se deu conta de que a opinião dele não é mais legítima do que de qualquer outro pesquisador apenas porque ele esteve diretamente envolvido e foi o primeiro a tentar sistematizar a parada em texto. É como se todas as pesquisas sobre tropicalismo utilizassem apenas alguma definição do Caetano Veloso como válida para o movimento.

Tom Wolfe precisa ser superado. Até porque seu texto sobre new journalism é, no mínimo, de qualidade duvidosa – apesar de ser bem sedutor e gostoso de ler. Esse papo de que a literatura abandonou a realidade e de que assim cometeu um erro, putz, que balela… Um artista tem que estar preocupado em se expressar, se isso coincidir com o gosto do púiblico, tudo bem. Se não coincidir, tudo bem também. Não há certo ou errado. E depois ainda vem dizer que a ficção não terá mais função em nossa sociedade. Não sei não ein, acho que o homem sempre precisará sonhar. Em tempos de reality shows, o fenômeno de vendas é uma série sobre vampiros. E não vai deixar de ser assim. Queira o homem de terno branco ou não.

Texto: Ale Lucchese

Much ado is being made of Rupert Murdoch’s recent indications that News Corp. might go about blocking Google from indexing their various properties, presumably to coincide with efforts to move to a more “pay for content” model. Phrases like “delusional old fool” and “people will never pay for the news again” seem to sum up the bulk of the reactions I’ve read.

Hold on now people, not so fast.

First, I don’t make a habit of flippantly brushing off the ideas of gazillionaires. Usually, they have the bank that they do from making good business decisions, not delusional ones.

Delusion aside, and I know I’m at risk of being called delusional myself by flying in the face of all that is 2.o, but is paying for news content so far fetched?

I’ll admit, I don’t have an answer. But I don’t completely subscribe to the assertion that, if faced with a pay or walk scenario, that everyone will choose to “get it somewhere else” just because it’s free.

Think about it, there are plenty of examples where people will go out of their way, or spend more, for one product or service over another. Everyone has at least one of those out-of-the-way, yet very successful restaurants in their town. You know the one: it’s not on the main drag, doesn’t do a lot of advertising and yet, it seems to defy the odds by staying in business year after year.

What makes people go out of their way to spend their money?

Simple. People will go out of their way to spend their money, and/or spend more for a product or service, if they:

1. can’t get what they’re looking for anywhere else; or
2. believe that they’re getting something better than they would anywhere else (quality, prestige, whatever).

It holds true for that out-of-the-way restaurant, the $200 pair of Nike kicks, the Tag Heuer watch, you name it. So why should the news be any different? Sure, if people are only looking for facts, any Googled resource may be good enough. But what if they’re looking for more?

Just asking.

SG

O americano Truman Capote foi um escritor versátil: produziu textos de qualidade em vários gêneros (contos, peças, reportagens, adaptações para TV e roteiros para filmes). Mas sua grande obra foi o romance-reportagem A sangue frio, que conta a história da morte de toda a família Clutter, em Holcomb, Kansas, e dos autores da chacina.Capote decidiu escrever sobre o assunto ao ler no jornal a notícia do assassinato da família, em 1959. Quase seis anos depois, em 1965, a história foi publicada em quatro partes na revista The New Yorker. Além de narrar o extermínio do fazendeiro Herbert Clutter, de sua esposa Bonnie e dos filhos Nancy e Kenyon – uma típica família americana dos anos 50, pacata e integrada à comunidade -, o livro reconstitui a trajetória dos assassinos. Perry Smith e Dick Hikcock planejaram o crime acreditando que se apropriariam de uma fortuna, mas não encontraram praticamente nada.Perry era um sonhador. Teve criação conturbada e violenta, e achava que a vida lhe tinha dado golpes injustos. Dick, considerado o cérebro da dupla, queria apenas arrebatar o dinheiro e desaparecer. Presos e condenados, ambos morreram na forca em 1965.Publicado no mesmo ano da execução dos assassinos, A sangue frio rapidamente se tornou um sucesso de crítica e vendas, rendendo alguns milhões de dólares ao autor. A intensa relação que Capote estabeleceu com suas fontes foi determinante para o êxito da obra. Além de passar mais de um ano na região de Holcomb, investigando e conversando com moradores, ele se aproximou dos criminosos e conquistou sua confiança. Traçou um perfil humano e eloqüente dos dois meninos, como costumava chamá-los. Por seu estilo que combina a precisão factual com a força emotiva da criação artística – um romance de não-ficção, nas palavras do próprio autor -, A sangue frio é um marco na história do jornalismo e da literatura dos Estados Unidos. Reflexão sutil sobre as ambigüidades do sistema judicial do país, o texto desvenda o lado obscuro do sonho americano.

Dados técnicos

Título: A Sangue Frio
Título original: In Cold Blood
Autor: Truman Capote
Editora: Cia das Letras
Número de páginas: 440

Preço: 30 reais

OBS: Frete único de 5 reais para todo o Brasil

Para entender como adquirir o livro, clique aqui!

I’m getting tired of the true believers telling me how much better social media is than the mainstream media. This week the new media shamans went through another spasm of self-congratulatory masturbation over a story they picked up from the mainstream media.

“Balloon boy: A study in the new dissemination of news”  was one headline

“Balloon story shows power of social media” was another.

Both stories (which were ironically published by “old” media) marveled at Twitter’s ability to spread information that it was picking up from radio and television. Both stories missed the mark.

I wonder if their authors would have been equally amazed when telegraph wires magically spread news across North America in minutes rather than months.

Twitter, blogs, facebook or the latest shiny thing that falls within the category of new media or social media might have some merit but not as a “powerful new disseminator of news”. Radio, television and newspapers have a lock on that.

Social media is a kind of global water cooler where people can express wonder or indignation at the news of the day. But mainstream media is still creating that news. Original reporting in social media generally boils down to glowing descriptions of products, events, meals or hotel rooms that have been provided to the author for free.

As the balloon boy story was revealed to be a hoax, the social media commentators quickly changed their tune. They stopped crowing about how well they had spread the news and began criticizing the mainstream media for being deceived.

One blog asserted that coverage of the story showed why old media is irrelevant while new media is paving a new path. The change in direction was faster than a NASCAR spin out.

It’ s time for new media/social media acolytes to learn to get along with mainstream media rather than constantly predicting its death. Radio didn’t kill newspapers and TV didn’t kill radio. New media needs a history lession.

Our correspondent agency will soon celebrate its first year of existence, 20 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Then with TVE and now with aNews, we have always fought for quality and rigour in news reporting, every day searching for a new challenge, a new frontier. If the Berlin Wall fell again tonight, we would already be there.

The world changes and we all change with it. In the case of aNews, the current crisis pushes us to do more and helps us visualize this new service which is provided by all-time correspondents. We are journalists with extensive professional track records, but we have adapted to the new times. We have taken on the role of entrepreneurs in the audiovisual information market because we believe in the new journalism.

aNews is itself a product of this willingness to adapt. We are a correspondent agency based in Brussels, from where we cover news in Europe and coordinate our global platform. Our network of TV correspondents keeps on growing, especially in Europe and the Americas. We already have journalists in Berlin, London, Rome, Mexico, Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo, New York, Miami, and Los Angeles.

We offer the quality that we have always expected of ourselves for our work as correspondents. The difference lies in the cost; aNews’ rates benefit from shared logistics and a modern production set-up so that TV stations end up paying the price of a freelance journalist for the services of a correspondent a la carte. We cover breaking news but also offer investigative documentaries, special and live broadcasts.

The internet plays a key role in our development strategy, but we also work with the classic transmission and broadcast technologies, via satellite and optic fiber. Being multicultural is another of our strengths. The majority of our correspondents are bilingual English/Spanish speakers, which goes some way to explaining why our list of clients is beginning to include international TV stations in need of new journalists: in other words, reporters who know how to get there first and understand the demands of new media.

The key to success, we believe, lies in combining experience with the dynamism of a new generation of professionals. We are experts in current affairs, but we are also capable of offering analysis and commentary. We focus on news but that does not mean that we do not value debates or talk shows. The credibility and rigour we demand of ourselves is our best calling card wherever we may be: in the middle of an armed conflict, in forbidden places, at international summits, or covering stories in the world of entertainment and showbiz.

In ABC’s ‘The Media Report’s’ segment on literary journalism, Matthew Ricketson, from RMIT University, said:

In my view and experience literary journalism explores the complexities of events, of issues, of people’s lives; literary journalism takes you to places and tells you stories that you probably haven’t even dreamed of.  Literary journalism is better researched and better written than daily journalism; literary journalism plumbs emotional depths in ways that daily journalism studiously avoids, or clunks around. Literary journalism makes a deeper connection with its readers. A good piece of literary journalism stays with readers, like a good novel stays with a reader. To paraphrase the American critic, Ezra Pound, ‘Literary journalism is news that stays news’.

Perfectly put, Mr Ricketson.

Through the novel, a writer has this wonderful ability to immerse a reader in an imaginative world and draw them into the narrative through the power of words.  Creativity has no limits.  A mastered writer can have the capability to transcend reality and compel the reader to want more through the sheer clever manipulation of language.  For me, the best stories are those that are based on true ones.  Knowing that what you are reading is not just fiction, but that it actually occurred in real life, makes it more thrilling; more encapsulating; more interesting.  New journalism, or literary journalism or creative non-fiction as it is sometimes called, does exactly this.  It’s the telling of true events and facts in a stylized form.  As Jackie May puts it, new journalism is when “fictional writing devices collide with the world of facts.”

Ricketson also points out that there is “little doubt that [the genre is] becoming popular and that it’s making an impact.  You can find it in newspapers, but more often you’ll find it in magazines, and probably most often, you’ll find it in books.”  He notes some famous Australian examples, including John Bryson’s ‘Evil Angels’ (his account of the Azaria Chamberlain murder case), and Helen Garner’s ‘The First Stone’ (about the Ormond College sexual harassment case).

In an article entitled ‘Tom Wolfe’s Revenge’, Chris Harvey states that “the form is compelling, advocates say, because unlike the inverted pyramid style, it gives readers a reward for making it through the story.”

He goes on to say:

Kramer of Boston University says that an even greater reliance by newspapers on literary journalism would help readers sort out the complexities of life.  “The thing that’s wrong with most newspaper stories is they’re missing the human context,” he says, “You wonder what kind of person was that robber.”

Newspaper stories tell the facts and that’s it.  While that is certainly enough when one wants a general overview of what’s going on in the world, what about when you want to know more?  Sometimes I may be particularly interested in a certain story and a newspaper story just doesn’t tell you enough.  There are times when you just wonder; perhaps about a person’s past, or their family and friends, or the type of person that they used to be before a particular event; whatever it is, you just want to know more, and quite often, newspaper stories simply cannot give you that.  But new journalistic pieces can.  And in doing so, they may enable people to be less judgmental and more open-minded in everyday circumstances.

Bill Beauttler’s ‘Whatever Happened to the New Journalism?’ was written in 1984, but some of the points that he makes still transcend to present-day.  For instance, he says:

Clay Felker said that the New Journalism responded to ‘Esquire’s’ need to compete with the immediacy of television and newspapers.  It found writers who could bring verve and style to their treatment of dated events.  To obtain its unique coverage, the magazine turned to novelists, or writers who wrote like novelists.

At a time where newspaper sales are at an all-time low and more and more people are turning to the Internet for quick and easy news, perhaps new journalism is just what newspapers need.  Give readers something that they can’t just get for free over the Net.

Beuttler also remarked on Wolfe’s comment that increased affluence at the time of his writing resulted in bizarre lifestyles that he often explored in his articles.  In this day and age, freedom of expression has never been more encouraged, and with the likes of Paris Hilton and George W. Bush, I’m sure writers have a plethora of subjects to choose from!

In his thesis entitled ‘Whatever Happened to the New Journalism?’ Bill Beauttler argues that the genre of new journalism declined after the 1960s and ‘70s.  He says, “fictional techniques have not been abandoned by … writers, but they are being used sparingly and less flamboyantly.”

Beuttler provides several reasons for the new journalism’s decline:

-          Journalists entering the profession in the late ‘60s were more interested in television and advocacy journalism than in stylish writing

-          Absence of talented writers

-          Financial concerns affected magazine editors, who found that readers preferred short, streamlined writing to the heavily detailed new journalism

-          There was a conservative mood in the ‘80s preventing the new journalism from being published because editors fear that challenging the mainstream will cost them advertising and readership

While the new journalism may have experienced a decline during the ‘80s, it appears that it is flourishing now, with the introduction of literary journalism courses in numerous universities and colleges worldwide, including the University of Sydney.  And with reasons such as those stated above, it is without wonder that the genre didn’t die.  I find it hard to believe that there could be an absence of talented writers, and while it may be that more people were interested in television and advocacy journalism, there are always going to be a large amount of people who love to write.

Furthermore, Beuttler referred to Lillian Ross, who said that people eventually began to view [new journalism] practitioners as self-promotion artists, and this led to the overuse of first-person reporting, which most editors consider self-indulgent.

Another point made in the article is that some writers attempt to make narratives more interesting either by basing characters on a composite of real people, or making characters up altogether, undermining the new journalism’s credibility.  For example, Janet Cooke was fired from the Washington Post in 1981 for fabricating her Pulitzer Prize-winning feature story about an eight-year-old heroin addict, who never actually existed.

Beuttler stated:

Such scandals heightened distrust of the New Journalism among newspaper editors, who reasoned that fiction techniques led to fiction. “There is the danger of, to make your story better you fudge the facts,” said Knoblauch. “You build your scenes not quite the way they happened, but the way you wish they’d happened.

In ‘Tom Wolfe’s Revenge’, Chris Harvey makes the same point, saying that new journalism stories are often told from the perspective of one or more of the main characters, and readers become privy to a character’s thoughts but are not told how the thoughts were discerned by the reporter.

However, he also points out that:

… most literary journalists are no more likely to falsify quotes or stray from the truth than their colleagues writing in the inverted pyramid style. In fact, some say that because journalists writing the long story are more likely to be veterans, they are less likely to fudge quotes or embellish a story. They have hard-won reputations to safeguard.

Of course, this doubt would come to mind when reading any fiction-style writing.  So, perhaps authors could get ‘characters’ to vouch for the credibility of their story, and publish these notes either with the piece or on the Internet.

Going back to Beuttler’s article, he says:

The other thing bad about New Journalism,” added Judge, “was that after you got over being entertained, assuming the fella’s a hell of a writer, you’d ask your question, ‘Well, what have I learned?’ Usually you didn’t learn anything. You were just entertained, that’s all.

That’s a pretty big call.  It is arguable that new journalism enables audiences to learn even more than they would be able to through a newspaper story.  New journalism delves into the inner workings of the human minds behind the actions that news stories report on – how could you not learn something from that?!

An essay anaylsing objectivity in war reporting in the context of the changing culture of contemporary journalism.

The institutionalisation of journalism and its development as a distinct culture was a response to the concept of ‘responsibility’ among editors and foreign correspondents, along with the elevation of ‘objectivity’ to the dominant ideology of the profession (Carr-Saunders, 1964; Trice, 1993, p.60). In recent times however established journalistic standards are being widely questioned (Seib, 2002, p.40), particularly traditional, detached reporting for its dispassionate stance (Bell, 1996). The development of New Journalism in the 1960s and the more recent ‘journalism of attachment’ are challenging the fundamental notion of objectivity as an integral ideology of journalism, particularly in the reporting of wars and other atrocities. This report will analyse objectivity and the ongoing debate regarding its place in the changing culture of contemporary journalism, and argue that it is an unwarranted ideal in the context of war reporting.

Objectivity as an element of Anglo-US journalism was born a century ago to simplify the editing process and to rid journalism of analysis which could alienate the increasingly valued mass audience (Schudson, 1978). As a concept underpinning professional journalism, it is inherently ambiguous, but it can be treated in two distinct ways: firstly, as a theoretical foundation of reporting, or secondly, as a strategic ritual to defend the professional integrity of journalism as a profession (Tuchman, 1972). In the first instance, objective reporting is associated with ways of gathering news, for example, knowledge about places, people and events, and presenting them in a balanced and impartial manner. In this sense, objectivity is impossible; the very act of reporting, through the necessity of selection and hierarchical organisation of a story, places limitations on the ability to report the whole truth (Bourdieu, 1996, p.21).  Political, social and economic considerations that are now inherent to media institutions also suggest a subjective rather than objective outcome; objectivity therefore could also been seen not so much as a philosophical ideal, but rather as a function of efficient news gathering; a commercial imperative (Schudson, 1978; McLaughlin, 2002, p.163).

In the second sense, as a defensive, strategic ritual, objectivity is based on the assumption that “a series of ‘facts’ or truth claims about the world can be validated by the rules and procedures of a professional community” (McLaughlin, 2002, p.161). These rules and procedures however, such as the separation of ‘facts’ from ‘analysis’, the exercising of news values when judging newsworthiness and the presentation of conflicting possibilities and supporting evidence, whilst facilitating assertions of objectivity (and thus functioning as a defence against criticism), only allow an operational view of objectivity (Tuchman, 1972, pp.662-679). Bias is structured within the entire operational process; news views and constructs reality according to a dominant or institutional ideology without “any critical examination of that reality’s hidden agenda, its class interests, and its ideological bias” (Parenti, 1993, p.52). The bland reporting of facts through ‘objective’ reporting as a justification for professionalism is therefore insufficient in presenting all the dimensions of a news story.  

The concept of objectivity is seen as the main cause of antagonism between the two main roles of a war correspondent, around which the social identity of the profession is constructed (Tumber, 2003, p.222). In the first role, as previously stated, objective reporting is traditionally seen as a foundation for the professional integrity of journalism. This professionalism is founded on the basis that practitioners have mastered specific knowledge prerequisites essential to perform a distinct set of tasks, even if in practice required knowledge is more related to experience and practice rather than abstractions (Abbot, 1988, p.7). These abstractions operating and modifying the specific tasks however are based on the ideologies of objectivity and neutrality; in this sense, objectivity is facilitated by remaining ‘detached’ from the aspirations and anxieties of those affected by war (Pedelty, 1995, p.100).

The second role of war correspondents points to the inherent social and moral values associated with the profession, the growing acceptance and evolution of this role in contemporary journalism serving as the main instigator of the objectivity debate. This ‘moral imperative’ can be viewed in regard to various aspects. Firstly, war correspondents, whether consciously or unconsciously, attempt to catch the attention and sentiments of their audiences, who are seen as ignorant about world affairs, to make them aware of atrocities around the world (Seib, 2002). The ideal of ‘truth’ and a ‘sense of making history’ are seen as principal incentives, resulting in the elevation of the profession as a ‘vocation’ (McLaughlin, 2002, pp.15-16). Secondly, this role is based on the postmodern understanding that news plays an inherent part in the social construction of reality and that the production of news has a significant influence over the course of subsequent events. Jake Lynch (2004) expands on this view, arguing that behaviour and experiences are constructed by internalised narratives.  News therefore, as one of the most powerful and important of these narratives, exerts significant influence on the complex processes at work in world events.

It is this second role of ethical responsibility that supplants objectivity in war reporting. While traditionally journalism was seen as having to be detached, dispassionate and therefore supposedly objective, the realities and complexities of contemporary journalism and modern warfare means this method is no longer feasible.  The end of the first Gulf War was seen as a turning point in the development of ‘moral’ journalism and a demand for ‘reattachment’.  Much of the coverage of the war, particularly Western reporting, was criticised for being ‘debilitatingly ironic’ and a downplaying of journalism’s social role; the postmodern trend of early 90s journalism, which saw an emphasis of aesthetics over ethics, saw journalists torn between ‘fascination with high tech weaponry’, surgical precision bombing and ‘the humanitarian ethos of broadcasting’ (Philos, 1995). This criticism, along with a demand for reporting not only the direct, but also the structural and cultural effects of war, saw the elevation of the concept of ‘journalism of attachment’. Here, neutrality, objectivity and detachment are suspended and emphasis is placed on ability to engage the audience, in order to make them aware of the “incontrovertible reality of human suffering” (Seib, 2002). It is also be explained by the desire to find the ‘truth’ and act as witnesses to horror that journalists encounter, thus validating the postmodern recognition that by observing an object, one becomes a part of it and affects how in unfolds, in a concept termed by anthropologists as the ‘participant observer’ (Seib, 2002; Brayne, 2004, p.276).

This report however is not advocating journalism of attachment per se; an overemotional moral investment in war reporting can lead to what Mark Urban describes as “a view of conflict in which you simply concentrate on the civilian victims and you only interview the military protagonists through a heavy filter of cultural bias or aggressive… innuendo (which) is utterly self-defeating” (1999). Rather, this report holds that objectivity, both in ideological and ethical terms, is unwarranted in war reporting, particularly where it nullifies inconvenient truths or where it gives false legitimacy to atrocities. In cases such as war, objectivity can rob journalism of intellectuality, passion and perspective; it does not allow any moral, intellectual or political engagement and therefore provides no “imaginative understanding for the minds of the people with whom (one) is dealing” (Carr, 1986, p.18). This however, does not mean sympathy for people involved in a story, which implies partiality, but rather, the acknowledgement of the unavoidable subjectivities inherent in reporting, in order to fulfil journalism’s ethical role; journalists cannot lay claim to “providing the highest standards of objective and balanced reporting while still presenting themselves as impartial arbiters pressing for action” (Burns, 1996, p.98).

War correspondents, therefore, “need to find a balance between the practical and ethical demands of reporting, and our responsibilities as citizens” (Hilsum, 1997, p.32). This is perhaps best described by Mark Pedelty (1995) as ‘honest journalism’, where when objectivity is not possible, honesty is the ultimate standard a journalist should strive for; an ethic of ‘individual conscience’ is favoured over institutionalised notions of objectivity where they are detrimental in explaining the often hidden complexities of war where there is more than one valid perspective. This does not mean the simplified, mythologising of conflict into a metaphysical struggle between good and evil; this encourages voluntary and moral self-censorship where journalists and their feelings and prejudices become the story. This is one of the main criticisms of ‘journalism of attachment’ as a moral self-justification for a profession compromised by cynicism and profit motive (Hume, 1997). Rather, the best position for an ‘honest journalist’ is an ‘attitude of clarity’, where journalists clearly define their position, while believing firmly that comprehensive analysis is the best way to reinforce that position (Southworth, 1977, p.16).

The ideological importance of objectivity, neutrality and detachment thus have to be re-examined as cultural forms of war reporting and in particular ideological framework of journalism in general, changes. The traditional structure of war is changing, with conflict between uniformed armies, limited civilian casualties, proportionate use of force and agreed warfare conventions all aspects of the past (Sreberny, 2002). This alters the psychological dimension and conventional frameworks of war reporting, and has accelerated a tendency towards adopting emotionally literate reporting, expressed through less ‘detached’ and more emotional journalistic expressions (Tumber, 2003). Whatever stance, it is clear the notion of objectivity is becoming an increasingly ambiguous and consequently, unwarranted ideal in the reporting of conflict.

Bibliography

Calcutt, A., 2004, “Chapter 9 – Post-Political Journalism: Ethics and Aesthetics Among News Manufacturers”, pp.171-187, Lynch, J., “Chapter 14 – Reporting the World: The Ethical Challenge to International News”, pp.261-275, Brayne, M., “Chapter 15 – Emotions, Trauma and Good Journalism”, pp.275-285, Paterson, C., Sreberny, A. (eds), International News in the Twenty-First Century, John Libbey Publishing, Eastleigh, UK.

McLaughlin, G., 2002, “Chapter 8 – War, Objectivity and the Journalism of Attachment”, The War Correspondent, Pluto Press, London, pp.153-182.

Paul, C., Kim J.J. 2004, Reporters on the Battlefield: The Embedded Pressed System in Historical Context, RAND Corporation, California.

Tumber, H., 2004, “Chapter 10: Prisoners of News Values?: Journalists, Professionalism, and Identification in Times of War”, Allan, S., Zelizer, B. (eds), Reporting War: Journalism in Wartime, Routledge, New York, pp.190-206.

Tumber, H., Prentoulis, M. 2003, “Chapter 15: Journalists Under Fire: Subcultures, Objectivity and Emotional Literacy”, Thussu, D., Freedman, D, (eds), War and the Media: Reporting Conflict 24/7, SAGE Publications Ltd, London, pp.215-231.

THE NEW AUTOBIOGRAPHY 

The New Autobiography is a vibrantly democratic and deeply personal type of narrative writing that, while little understood, is becoming popular in our culture.  it is new because it is being written by new voices, not only those who represent the official and dominant view from the top.  It is new because it is written as self-discovery rather than self-promotion.  It is new because it beholds the individual’s life, not through Puritan mandates of moral edification, nor nineteenth-century credos of materialistic success, nor twentieth-century formulas of reductionist psychology, but through the cohesion of literature and myth. It is a way of saying, “I matter; this life I have lived has meaning!  And because I tell it from my perspective, because I frame it, it has the meaning I give it.”

            Like the New Journalism developed by Tom Wolfe and other magazine writers of the late 1960s, New Autobiography appropriates storytelling devices from the realistic novel.  It is often written in dramatic scenes with dialogue and interior monologues.  It uses novelistic devices to reach inner truths, not just the truth of facts.

            To shape an autobiographic story, in the process you recall your yearnings and dreams and their place in your destiny.  You are led away from perceiving your history as a series of accidents or calamities that wrongly formed you.  “We are less damaged by the traumas of childhood, James Hillman (The Soul’s Code) writes, “than by the traumatic way we remember childhood.” and  “We dull our lives by the way we conceive them.  We have stopped imagining them with any sort of romance, any fictional flair.”  Through the autobiographic process you restore the “romance” and the “fictional flair” of story to your own life, and you replace old stories of powerlessness with stories of consciousness and revelation in which you are the protagonist.  By applying story structure to your life you necessarily replace unconscious, unexamined scripts with consciously chosen stories…  Stories lead to a climax that is a point of transformation. 

            When I view myself as the heroine of my own story, I no longer complain about the conflicts in my life and in myself.  I am no longer a victim of circumstances…  I am a protagonist in a world of unending dilemmas that contain hidden meaning that is up to me to discover.  I am the artist of my life who takes the raw materials given, no matter how bizarre, painful or disappointing and gives them shape and meaning.  I am within each scene and each chapter of my life, defining my character through the choices I make.  I am on my own side, rooting for myself, aching for myself, celebrating my sensual experiences, marveling in the exquisite subtlety of feeling in my life that novelists have made me aware of in their books. I am as engaged with the ongoing story in my life as is a reader who eagerly turns the page.

      In its simplest form a story is: what you wanted, how you struggled and what you realized out of that struggle.  A story is a series of interrelated events that you made happen and that happened to you, and the consequence.  The consequence is a change in you.  In an autobiographic story, change may occur in other characters, but it must also occur in you, because you are the protagonist.  The change may come form an event (you married, you got old), but it is also a moral change.  You had a realization, a shift in values or perception.  In other words, within the story you made a “character arc,” you had a change in character…  You trace this character arc in an autobiographic story by including your feelings, reactions to the events you experienced and your realizations.  You give the events of your life significance because of what they meant to you and how you changed from your engagement with them.  An autobiographic story is not just an account of events; it is the charting of your emotional, moral and psychological course, which gives meaning to those events.

                                          –Tristine Rainer, Your Life as Story

EXERCISE 2:

             Sit in a comfortable chair with your pen and paper at hand, at a time and in a spot where you won’t be interrupted.  if it’s your office, turn off the phone.  Begin by relaxing your body and mind.  Systematically tighten and relax all your muscles, then take a deep breath, hold it–then release it completely, releasing all tension.  Close your eyes and take another deep breath.  Release the tension.  And again.  Allow your breathing to become deep and regular.  When you feel relaxed, allow that  special place to come to mind, where as a child you were most yourself.  Is it a wide open expanse or is it confined in some way?  Sense the size and strength of your body at the age you were when you enjoyed this place.  Are you moving, sitting, standing?  Are you alone or with another?

            Now begin to accumulate more information by asking yourself questions.  Each time you think “I can’t remember,” relax and invent an answer. Don’t worry if you are fantasizing rather than really remembering, as long as the answer feels plausible.

            Ask yourself and imagine: What do I see?  What do I feel on my skin?  What do I hear?  What do I smell?  What do I taste?  What is the light like here?  What do I want?  What do I think/ What feelings do I have?  In a minute you will write in the present tense what comes to you.  Allow your imagination to take over where memory stops as you write.  So far the scene you are describing is probably like a slide, full of detail but without movement.  Now add movement.  Turn it into a film.  See and feel yourself move a part of your body.  If you can, actually move as you would have then.  Ask yourself: And then what happens?  What do you do?  What do you think or say?  What changes?  Write whatever comes without censoring it.

(Option): On a large piece of paper draw the floor plan of the house or apartment you lived in when you were 7 years old, including the hallways, bathrooms, bedrooms, back and front yards.  After you have completed it with as much detail as you can, put it aside and find a quiet place to write a reverie about it.  Imagine yourself approaching this house the way you had to get there, from a sidewalk, driveway, up three steps to the door–however you entered.  Once inside, walk through and enter a room or place of your choice.

            Now imagine the details, furnish the room–where is the bed or table, is there a fireplace or cupboards, are there rugs or carpets on the floor?  Is it day or night?  Are there lamps or overhead lights?

            Place yourself inside this room and allow your writing to go where it will, exploring your feelings and thoughts at the age you were when you lived there, concentrating on your interaction with other people in the house.

Talese recentemente lançou no Brasil o livro Vida de Escritor

Gay Talese foi repórter do New York Times e escreveu para grandes revistas americanas, como Times, The New Yorker e Harper´s Magazine. Na Esquire, foi autor da melhor matéria já publicada pela revista: Frank Sinatra Has a Cold, considerada por Tom Wolfe como a criação do New Journalism. “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” foi publicada em Abril de 1966 e foi considerada como uma das mais célebres reportagens do jornalismo norte-americano: um exemplo pioneiro do que viria a ser conhecido como “New Journalism” (“Novo Jornalismo”) – caracterizado por um trabalho de apuração de fatos rigorosa aliado a uma forma de narrativa anteriormente reservada a ficção.

“Frank Sinatra Has a Cold”

Reportagens mais célebres já publicadas pela Esquire.

Now that first semester is over with, gone are the days that we have to write for 12-year-olds all day, pretending to dream that our assignments could make it onto the front pages of mass-circulated newspapers. We no longer have to suffocate as much information as possible into the first sentence of a news story in the outdated inverted pyramid style.   I, more than double the age of the supposed target audience, often have trouble digesting let alone writing these stories.

Yesterday Andrew Rule, renowned Australian feature writer, came to speak with our Feature Writing class. He explained that a good feature should be like a novel or a film, and that good description can often be inspired from novels of any genre.

I was thrilled to hear this from “an expert,” because I’ve been trying to use my time “down under”, away from my usual distractions in the US (proximity to Vegas was always a soft spot), to catch up on my reading. In addition to many in-depth, investigative works by journalists that are made into books, I also find inspiration from novels – sometimes in their powerful descriptions, and other times simply because it is a great story.  All of these books contain the fundamentals that (hopefully) will help to create a great journalist.

I will attempt to separate the books on my shelf right now into some lists below.

Books by Journalists

Fool’s Gold, by Gillian Tett: This book was left behind by my older sister Jen when she visited. It’s an excellent description of finance and the lead-up to the GFC, providing a detailed explanation of the credit derivatives market and how it all began at J.P. Morgan. Tett worked for a number of years as a financial journalist and has great journalistic style.

Right Stuff, by Tom Wolfe: This is the only book by Tom Wolfe (my favourite author) at the RMIT library that I hadn’t yet read.  He has an amazing, unmatched ability to dive into all walks of life and explicitly describe each of the characters.  This particular book is about US test pilots.

Godfather in Australia : organised crime’s Australian connections, by Bob Bottom: The writer has been cited by a few of our teachers to be one of the best investigative journalists in the counry.

All the President’s Men, by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein

Armies of the Night, by Norman Mailer: a first person account of Mailer’s experience at the March of the Pentagon, a Vietnam War rally.  This book won the Pulitzer for general non-fiction in 1969.

Killed: Great Journalism Too Hot to Print, edited by David Wallace: includes stories by many famous journalists, mostly in the US (such as George Orwell, Betty Friedan, and P.J. O’Rourke), whose stories weren’t published, along with descriptions of what led to their story’s demise.

Novels

March, by Geraldine Brooks:  This won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2006.  Since I got to Australia, I have been trying to read all of the winners in this category.  I am especially excited to read this one because Little Women is actually my all-time favourite book, and this tells the story in the eyes of the absent father.  In the last few months, I also read Olive Kitteridge (2009) and The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2008), and am about to begin Road (2007).

The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald: I try to read or re-read at least one classic at a time. I took this out of the library a few weeks ago and have really been enjoying revisitng the story, especially appreciating Fitzgerald’s fantastic character development.

Breaking Dawn, by Stephanie Meyer: This is the fourth of the popular Twilight series.  I would put this into the category of a book that’s value is in the story as opposed to one that is exceptionally written.  That said, I have found the series to be very entertaining and am saving this final book for a rainy day when I will likely devour it in one sitting.

For Whom the Bell Tolls, by Ernest Hemingway:  I can’t wait to finally read this!  An online quiz entitled “which character in literature are you?” determined that I am Robert Jordan.

Adventures of Augie March, by Saul Bellow: I saw this listed on Time.com as one of the “Best All-Time Novels” I thought the list was ranked, but just now realised it was actually alphabetical, and I started with this one.  So far so good.

If you are still reading this, here is a list of my personal all-time favourites;

Ally’s Favourite Books

1. Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott
2. Bonfire of the Vanities, by Tom Wolfe
3. On The Road, by Jack Kerouac
4. The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway
5. Daughter of Fortune, by Isabel Allende
6. Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides
7. The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, by Tom Wolfe
8. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
9. A Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving
10. Valley of the Dolls, by Jacqueline Susann

Gay Talese

Gay Talese, 77 anos, um dos fundadores do Jornalismo Literário, que mistura narrativa de ficção com a realidade, esteve em São Paulo, no dia 08 de julho para participar da Festa Literária Internacional de Paraty, …

Nada mais comum que isso não???

Talese realmente é o fundador do New Journalism, tem  77 anos e esteve em São Paulo, mas aqui fugiremos das regras e quebraremos as barreiras…. Depois diga qual você prefere? (Seguindo sua proposta, como será que ficaria este texto? Segue abaixo um “perfil” de Talese a seu próprio modo…)

Gay Talese, o jornalista, o suficiente. Dispensa o uso de gravadores, telefone ou computador. Sustenta-se de próprio punho (oh pleonasmo) em entrevistas. No máximo senta-se em sua mesa para historias e utiliza uma máquina de escrever, que já faz parte de sua vida a mais de 35 anos.

Nascido em 7 de fevereiro de 1932, em Nova Jersey. Gay é irreverente desde criança. Na escola usava ternos da alfaiataria de seu pai, e isso fazia com que ele aparentasse mais idade do que seus coleguinhas. Aos 15 anos, já havia escrito 311 entre contos e colunas para o jornal na escola.

Um “tipinho” não convencional de jornalista que eu A-D-O-R-O!!!

Pausa para reflexão:

“É extremamente complicado, escrever sobre alguém que você sabe pouco, nunca viu pessoalmente e o pior ainda, é ter que confiar no que os outros escrevem pela Internet (oh vida), prometo que vou atrás para confirmar a veracidade dessas informações.” Ok! Agora voltamos ao texto…

Imparcial? Talvez… mas o que não se pode negar, é que ele observa muitos dos lados de uma vez. O jornalismo preciso, o enfoque global, o jornalista que sabe que há vários lados para as histórias e isso o faz olhar de uma forma variada, e porque não completa?

Auto-suficiente? Não, não o vejo tão pretensioso. Mas nunca utilizou telefone ou gravador para fazer as matérias….Gostava do olho no olho, de estudar a linguagem corporal da entrevista e a atmosfera do lugar.

Gay Talese diz que nas décadas de 50 e 60, os jornalistas era aficionados em escrever sobre “celebridades”, pessoas públicas, mas ele garante que nunca se interessou muito por esse tipo de trabalho. Sempre quis algo a mais, o desejo de usar técnicas de ficção para escrever sobre pessoas comuns ia contra os “princípios” de muitos escritores de não – ficção. Gay afirma que seu interesse era registrar momentos da vida privada, sem falsidade de eventos e sem nomes falsos.

“Tenho sido um contador de histórias, mas as histórias que eu conto envolvem pessoas reais, nada é inventado. É verdadeiro, não imaginado e não fabricado. É real e verificável. Eu apenas conto histórias no formato de ficção, mas faço questão de usar os nomes reais das pessoas sobre quem estou escrevendo. Foi isso que fiz por toda minha vida.”

Gay Talese

Enquanto Tom Wolfe não chega em Salvador, vou matando a saudade. ..

A partir de informações publicadas nos jornais A Tarde, Correio da Bahia e no BA TV, uma outra maneira de contar um fato. Exercício velho, mas bacana, feito em 10 de julho de 2007.

Um novo capítulo de um velho livro
 
O vizinho de parede esfregava o chão. O sangue na calçada, na frente de sua casa, aos poucos ficava rosado, misturado à água que era jogada. Uma vassoura de piaçava era o instrumento usado para fazer desaparecer da vista dos passantes as marcas de mais um crime. Um crime anunciado. Não foi a primeira vez. E, provavelmente, não será a última.

Antônio Conceição Reis sabia que estava jurado de morte. Ambientalista há mais de 18 anos, casado, pai de três filhos, negro, 44 anos, conhecido em Salvador, recebia ameaças constantes. Teve sua casa invadida no dia seis de fevereiro. A sede da ONG Nativos, grupo ecológico presidido por ele, já havia sido arrombada. Tentaram incendiar a barraca que ele cuidava, junto com a esposa, no Parque do Abaeté. As queixas estão registradas. De nada adiantou. Novamente, não foi a primeira vez.

Em 1988, outro conhecido ambientalista, também casado e pai de família, Chico Mendes, chegou a passar para polícia uma lista de seus possíveis assassinos. Nunca uma vítima teria sido tão clara e objetiva sobre aqueles que o abateriam, afirmou Zuenir Ventura, autor do livro “Crime e Castigo”, publicado em 2003. A história parece se repetir. E assim, como há quase 20 anos, a polícia não evitou que o pior acontecesse.

Antônio levou vários tiros na porta de sua casa, na manhã do dia nove de julho, quando chegava da escola de sua filha, depois de tê-la deixado na aula. Os criminosos o colocaram no porta-malas de um carro prata e o levaram. Na tarde do mesmo dia, por volta das 15h, Eliene Sampaio Reis, mulher de Antônio, já prestava depoimento na Delegacia de Itapuã. Por trás de seus óculos, sustentados por uma pele queimada de sol, seus olhos piscavam incessantemente. Rápidos, apreensivos, nervosos. Uma repórter apontava o microfone em direção ao seu rosto. As mãos de Eliene se apertavam. A aliança de casamento brilhava.

- Tinha muita gente que não gostava dele porque ele tirou o carnaval do Abaeté.

A conversa de Eliene com a delegada Francineide Moura teve que ser interrompida depois de uma ligação. Um corpo carbonizado e irreconhecível, apresentando marcas de tiros no tórax e cabeça, fraturas nas costelas, no crânio e em uma das mãos, havia sido encontrado dentro de um carro, próximo ao Recanto Ecológico Sucupira, uma reserva ambiental. Alguém teria cogitado se era pura ironia ou monstruosa premeditação. Só exames realizados pelo Instituto Médico Legal poderão confirmar se o corpo é do ambientalista.

- Quem poderia ter cometido um crime desses contra um homem que só fazia o bem? – questiona o amigo Raimundo Bujão.

A casa de Antônio passou o dia fechada. Estavam cerradas a porta e as duas janelas marrons, humildes acessos que sua família possui para o mundo. Os vizinhos não querem comentar. Eles têm medo. Os moradores da Rua Guararapes, no bairro de Itapuã, optaram pelo silêncio. É provável que não voltem a ver Antônio vivo. Só resta limpar a sujeira. Com água e vassoura.

continuing from

>

dunque, gli obiettivi di un progetto come ri-tratta sono duplici o, meglio, di due ordini di categorie:

1) tecnico

2) etico.

come detto, entrambi questi obiettivi devono essere perseguiti con efficacia.

in altre parole, ri-tratta deve rispondere su vari piani alle domande perché e come, senza trascurare in nessun momento il cosa-si-sta-facendo – fermo restando che il cosa è legato al perché ed al come.
l’ordine tecnico riconduce a questioni e considerazioni di metodo e, pertanto, anche di strategia, senza ovviamente esulare da considerazioni di carattere epistemologico.
in quanto frutto di lavoro professionale, l’indagine deve sottostare in certo modo ad una serie di parametri inscrivendosi – anche criticamente – in un quadro paradigmatico disciplinare e disciplinato.
il trait-d’union fra piano tecnico e piano etico è legato alle varie modalità di risposta che si possono fornire alla complessa questione del come-si-sta-facendo-cosa.

il come può essere inteso, infatti, in termini strettamente tecnici, oppure in termini di continua ricognizione etica. d’altro canto, se si porta avanti un qualunque sforzo con un’intenzione, allora si deve essere in grado di rispondere, in modo cosciente e complesso, alle implicazioni del perché lo si stia facendo, e queste non esulano dai modi in cui una cosa può essere fatta, e quelli in cui essa non può esser fatta, e questo, di nuovo, ci riporta al problema dei limiti del come-fare-qualcosa.
insomma, i piani tecnico ed etico sono realmente distinguibili solo in termini euristici, essendo intimamente interconnessi a livello di pratica e di svolgimento del lavoro.

noi ci adoperiamo per ri-tratta perché, in qualche modo, vogliamo alleggerire il mondo di un frammento dei suoi enormi pesi. lo facciamo senza presunzione, ma con molto impegno e serietà, probabilmente con un eccesso di ingenuità, vista la portata dell’obiettivo e del lavoro che abbiamo davanti. eppure, nei momenti di lucidità, ci riteniamo soddisfatti all’idea di poter provare a dare un nostro contributo ad un mondo che, dal nostro punto di vita, sia più equo e più giusto – nella fattispecie, risollevando la questione del razzismo, del contatto con la diversità e di alcune delle tante ingiustizie sociali in modo nuovo.

come detto, questo pone, fra i tanti, il problema dell’efficacia.

per essere efficaci, abbiamo deciso di credere in un metodo ibrido – neppure tanto nuovo – come l’incrocio di indagine etno-antropologica e fotografia.

quel che, a mio giudizio, è nuovo nel nostro lavoro è il modo (il come-facciamo-cosa) in cui ci muoviamo per provare a portare a casa i risultati. insomma, la novità non sarebbe costituita dagli elementi della ricetta, quanto dal dosaggio e, soprattutto, dall’ora e dal luogo del pasto. mangiare una bistecca speziata a pranzo, in effetti, è differente dal mangiare la stessa bistecca a colazione.

se, poco a poco, formandosi come fotografo, nicola si sta orientando verso un tipo di fotografia che cerca di contaminare reportage, street-photography, ritrattistica, e foto documentaria antropologica, pur con molti dubbi e ancora maggiori difficoltà di ottenere il sincretismo; io, dal canto mio, ho scelto un profilo etno-antropologico molto rischioso e non immediatamente riconoscibile come tale; per questo ho deciso di lasciare un ampio spazio alla narrazione (in uno stile prossimo a quello del new journalism - più kapuscinski che capote e gli altri americani) che solo di tanto in tanto si concede un excursus (mai totalmente extradiegetico) per approfondire l’elaborazione astratta, teorica e meta-metodologica.

ho scelto, pertanto, una serie di strategie retoriche, oratorie e stilistico discorsive che mi permettono più di mostrare che non di dimostrare. ma le mie scelte sono anche animate da una consapevolezza: conscio del fatto che questo lavoro non potrebbe esistere prescindendo dal mio filtro ermeneutico-soggettivo, ho preferito non rimuoverlo (come troppo spesso si tende a fare) ma sottolinearlo, dando a tutti i lettori l’accesso al mio punto di osservazione.

la mia scommessa è che fornire una chiave in più possa aiutare tanto la narrazione antropologica ad acquisire più forza, densità e scorrevolezza, quanto i lettori ad evitare gli ostacoli che, uno stile di scrittura mutuato dalle scienze dure o statistiche, ha disseminato sul loro percorso. sul pianto fattuale, infatti, è solo dall’imprescindibile commistione fra il mio punto di vista e il mio punto di osservazione che posso raccontare la realtà che mi capita di vivere in primo luogo come persona e poi come antropologo. infatti, è solo se vivo qualcosa come persona che poi posso restituirla, opportunamente riflessa e disciplinata, da antropologo.

la mia motivazione, che vuole essere anche un apporto alla scienza antropologica, è che la narrazione – il più possibile flessibile, affabulatoria e vicina alle forme dell’oralità – oltre ad essere il modo di comunicazione che – a più livelli di lettura e più strati – raggiunge più targets, è anche il tipo di tessitura più capace di collazionare in modo elastico. insomma, dentro un romanzo si può, con meno stress, porre parti saggistiche, mentre un saggio può contenere con molta fatica aneddoti.

ritengo, pertanto, che narrare, in presa diretta con dialoghi e con ampio ricorso a discorso diretto ed indiretto liberi, le avventure di due ricercatori in azione, offra la possibilità di ovviare la trappola della violenza epistemica contenuta nelle generalizzazioni antropologiche, di aggirare l’ostacolo del presente storico e scavalcare il cortocircuito dell’allocronia, destreggiandosi con maggiore agilità di quella permessa dalla pesante densità oggettivante e desoggettivizzata propria dello stile retorico del saggio scientifico.

se i miei punti di riferimento disciplinari sono clifford geertz, vincent crapanzano e james clifford, ho cercato di evitarne il barocchismo erudito e sovrabbondante (geertz e clifford) o l’eccesso di speculazione intimistica (crapanzano). il mio obiettivo è infatti non la descrizione densa, ma la restituzione di una semplicità densa, o, se si preferisce, una descrizione profonda finto-ingenua. in questo, molto mi sono state utili le letture di renato rosaldo e nigel barley.

ad esempio, partiamo da una cosa apparentemente casuale: perché ho scelto la narrazione in presa diretta?
infatti, raccontare costantemente al presente, dal punto di vista eminentemente narrativo, ha limitato molte opzioni discorsive e molte soluzioni stilistiche, fra tutte le possibilità di flashback, quella di ritorno riflessivo approfondito, o quella di giocare sulla separazione esplicita fra autore storico, narratore, narratario e personaggio protagonista. insomma, ne è, superficialmente, risultata privilegiata la levità e la leggerezza, che spesso può esser confusa con la superficialità.
la peculiare prospettiva scelta, mi costringe, ogni volta, a narrare fittiziamente come se, io che scrivo, non sapessi, al pari del personaggio che esperisce i fatti narrati, quel che è accaduto dopo, o non ci avessi, in qualche modo, riflettuto. ho dunque scelto uno stile che mi ha portato a fare un lavoro di erosione ed elisione piuttosto che uno di agglutinazione, autoimponendomi dei margini dai limiti molto stretti e ardui da rispettare. questa scelta, totalmente consapevole, mi induce ad uno sforzo di disciplina che, mi rendo conto, nella scrittura, così lineare ed apparentemente semplice, non traspare, o non fino in fondo. così come non pesa sul testo l’ampio grappolo di rinunce e soluzioni che questa determinazione stilistico-narrativa mi costringe ad osservare. penso agli sforzi per calibrare e sintetizzare, in modo da non sviare eccessivamente dalla narrazione, lo spazio riservato alle riflessioni. le riflessioni, infatti, devono riverberare sulla narrazione senza invaderla o schiacciarla. d’altro canto, sono molto avvertito dei rischi ai quali, una simile operazione, mi espone con gli altri antropologi o scienziati sociali in genere. le critiche possono variare da “ma questo è un romanzo, al limite una cronoca” fino a “è la scelta megalomane di un egocentrico privo del senso del ridicolo”.

come detto, uno degli antropologi più lungimiranti che io abbia mai letto – nigel barley – ha, secondo me, reso un ottimo servizio alla disciplina ed alla letteratura più in generale, narrando le sue disavventure di ricerca sul campo in un modo ugualmente leggero ma non per questo non serio, di sicuro ha abbandonato la seriosità in favore di un’apertura del registro comunicativo ad una gamma più ampia e diversificata di lettori attraverso lo stratagemma ludico ed il tono ironico.

tuttavia, la mia scelta è ancora diversa da quella di barley e non solo per la presenza di un paritario apparato fotografico – cosa che avvicina, in qualche modo, ri-tratta a lavorare piace di alain de bottom. la scelta operata in ritratta è diversa a livello stilistico e di obiettivi. barley, infatti, ricorre alla più testata ed autorevole scelta narrativa al passato (uso di imperfetto e passato remoto), io, invece, ho deciso di scrivere in un presente effettivo, deittico e storicizzante.

perché?

la ragione è che cerco di ottenere un effetto di plurimo straniamento delocalizzando a più livelli il cronotopo e cercando una implosione di presenti che faccia, almeno a livello pre- o subcosciente, scaturire il prurito di un dubbio intellettuale circa il patto narrativo.

c’è un primo presente (p’) che è quello di quando si son verificati gli eventi narrati – è il presente fattuale delle persone reali

c’è un secondo presente (p”) che è quello interno alla narrazione degli eventi narrati – è il presente narrativo dei personaggi, a cui appartiene anche il narratore e il narratario

c’è il presente (p”’) che è quello storico del momento nel quale io, rielaborando mentalmente e autorialmente appunti e ricordi, ho scritto e dato forma alla narrazione – è il presente dell’autore storico

c’è, infine, il presente dei lettori (p””) – diverso per ciasun lettore e ciascuna lettura

la mia scelta di scrivere in presa diretta cerca, attraverso lo scandalo della rimozione della reale consecuzione temporale dei diversi presenti, di riproporne la necessità per negazione. la consecutio, nei miei intenti, diviene tanto più (inconsciamente) necessaria alla piena e densa fruizione quanto più essa è negata nella superficialità del dipanarsi della narrazione. inoltre, questa negazione, congiuntamente alla scelta di raccontare i due reali indagatori (me e nicola) come personaggi coevi e non allocroni, mi permette di evitare – nella pratica fruitiva dei lettori – la trappola del presente storico.

per quanto possa apparire paradossale, l’uso spregiudicato che faccio del presente, fissa i contenuti ed i fatti in un momento, ontico, del passato reale: è stato così in quell’occasione e per quei due, ma ad altri sarebbe capitato altrimenti. il mio è un presente storicizzante che ha lo scopo di suggerire l’irripetibilità storica dei fenomeni in esame, dischiudendone al contempo la porta della speculazione e la finestra dei giudizi.

to be continued

>

Two stories in the past 24 hours have taken Twitter, and one can only assume, the World by storm.

One story deals with a boy (maybe, we’re still waiting to find out) in a balloon, and the other a former presidential hopeful’s daughter sharing, and regretting a photo of her, um, balloons via Twitter.

Meghan McCain shares a TwitPic of her "spontaneous night in".

It all started Wednesday night with a tweet from Meghan McCain (@McCainBloggette), daughter of John and notorious Tweeter. In the tweet, McCain posted a Twitpic of herself (left) with the tagline “my spontaneous night in”.

What followed was a storm of tweets, both pro and con, from supportive to downright nasty, a mini-meltdown by the McCainBlogette and even threats of (oh no) pulling a Miley and deleting her account. “Traditional” media picked it up Thursday morning and the storm continued.

A day later, McCain chalks it up to a good learning experience, regrets the pic, (that’s still to be deleted, BTW) and says she has more to say on her blog. After that, there will be no more talk of it, she says.

I doubt many people would be talking about it tomorrow anyway. That just seems to be the way these “storms” go. A lot of bluster for a day or two, if even, then nothing.

The second story deals with a boy in Colorado who, it’s believed, floated off in the family’s experimental balloon. Yes, the family’s experimental balloon. For an hour or two, Twitter creaked from the weight of the thousands of tweets pouring in about the “balloon boy”, most of them saying something to the effect of “I have no idea what’s going on”.

After the balloon landed, with no boy inside, the Twitter sentiment shifted. Tweets of concern and the boy’s whereabouts turned to questions of doubt (a scam-ola, perhaps?) and of the boy’s family background. No sooner had the balloon touched down, the Huffington Post had an interesting back story of the family, complete with video and tales of a history of “mad scientist”-like behaviour from the father.

How quickly the Twitterstorm changes course.

So, another day, another “scandal” or two hits The Twitter. The Internet may have a long memory, but it definitely has a short attention span to match. These stories will blow over, or fade away as quickly as they came. They always do. Tomorrow’s another day.

What are you gonna do?

SG

UPDATE: She deleted the pic (almost 24 hours later), and the kid was found hiding in the attic. Oh, and I did not make any of this up.