1. nuances of news reporting: a
socio-cultural assessment
(WORK IN PROGRESS)
Jagadish Pokhrel
Bipin Acharya

2. background: towards a tale of two studies
• observant participation, 2002-03
• Post-1990 policy changes had ended the
monopoly of The Rising Nepal
• In 2002-03, TRN was struggling for a
foothold in the transforming media
landscape
• Elsewhere, ethnographers immersed
further into the journalistic field
• A TRN journalist, I tangoed with an
anthropologist to study the news
• My observant participation (Bell, 1993)
brought the tacit knowledge and the role
of agency in news making to sharp focus
• The Earthling-Martian collaboration
resulted in a narrative description of the
news craft as practiced at TRN
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• survey assessments, 2012-13
• Media Foundation Nepal, a media thinkand-do-tank, surveyed Nepali journalists
and the public
• Findings more generalizable
• With the benefit of hindsight, I wanted to
see how the findings spoke to my
observation of the TRN newsroom
• I juxtaposed details and depth with numbers
and breadth and tuned in where they resonated
• The purpose was to see how the two studies
told a tale about the hard questions and
constraints of the profession
• One handled these in so many words or another
counted ‘yes’ and ‘no’ or ‘can’t say’– e.g. the
role of journalism in society?
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3. objectives of this paper
• Overall aim
•Foreground the nuances of the journalistic craft while revisiting a newsroom
observation and a survey research, a decade and two methods apart, to
explore what it is that resonates in the studies at the level of the profession
• Specific objectives
•Bring a native view to news making and shed light on its practical nuances
while, at the same time, meeting the rigors of a Martian perspective
•Discuss the agency and the tacit knowledge of journalists
•Discuss some hard questions about the profession
•Articulate the desires of the craftspeople
•Highlight what constrains journalistic work – from locating to reporting facts
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4. observant participation
• Context of study
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Journalism permeated into many theaters of social experience
Some big names in the private media were ex-TRN journalists
Most criticism of TRN text showed omission of facts, not commission of distortion, errors,
The subtext, the government, was invisible presence in news routines and bureaucracy
The practice of news craft, the setting, practitioners, their hopes and fears were worth studying
Not many journalists handled email
We huddled around the chief reporter as he struggled to use a gifted Sony handheld
• Why ethnography
• Ethnographers had found a timely and fertile topic in journalism (Boyer & Hannerz, 2006)
• Observant participation took us straight to a newsroom in action
• Triangulation of observation, interview and text analysis authenticated interpretation of the W’s, H, and So What of
news making
• Anthropological field dichotomies, universal-particular, subjective-objective, and terms, life-world, habitus, etc,
assured productive engagement
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5. survey assessments, 2012
•What they were
•Media Foundation Nepal, a think-and-do-tank, carried out the survey assessments,
they were kind of baseline studies. The report is available
@ http://www.media-foundation.org/uploaded/pdf/Media_and_The_Nepali_Public_2012.pdf
• The report showcases the findings of: Journalists' Survey (N=838), Public Opinion
Survey (N= 2,252), SMS poll (N=739) and Focus group discussions (FGDs)
• Overall goal of the surveys
• Assess the media environment of Nepal
• Immediate objectives
• Identify media capacity development priorities in light of the following: Attributes of Nepali
journalists, their professional challenges, their perceptions of media credibility, and capacity
development needs
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6. methods
• A close reading and comparison of two studies
• In self-reports, facts, numbers and interpretations at the level of profession
• Fresh literature review
• Breakdown of the news production process into categories
• locate, elicit, collect, select, plan, write, edit, send for production, etc
• Reading the research reports in light of this production process
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7. findings
• From observant participation, 2002
• Through a week’s newsroom observation, several unstructured interviews, and analyses of
front page news stories over two months, the TRN study asked:
• What can reporters tell us about their professional practices?
• What does a close reading of a sample of news stories reveal?
• The reporters had so much to tell the researchers about their professional
practices (objectives related)
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News is a product of multiple hands
Ownership structure of the newsroom imposes limits to news work
News work is a routinized desire to tell a good story
News re-creates an event
News is understandable because the producers and consumers collaborate
• A close reading of the interviews and news stories revealed lofty craft desires of
journalists, despite severe constraints (to engage, inform, educate, so on.)
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8. findings, contd. 1
HIGHLIGHTS
• The native condition (method related)
• When the excitement of starting into journalism fades, you settle in with a routine (like a clerk, one informant
says)
• “What is news?” I ask a friend. “You know it, come on,” he grins at me. (the difficulty of interviewing
colleagues)
• “Man bites dog is news , another colleague tells me on further probe, “but not always. You know that at TRN,
right?”
• “How do you know you got all the facts for your story?” I ask. “When you run out of questions, stop asking
the sources, or when you think you need to go to office, to meet the deadline!”
• The tango (method related)
• “Man-bites-dog is quite an interesting definition of what is news,” my Martian supervisor tells me. “Now
start triangulation, analyze content, hold focus groups.”
• The Earthling is intimidated. “Triangulation sounds like something really worth doing,” a hard-boiledjournalist, I tell Bipin sir, showing a bit of my awe and skepticism about the scholarly process.
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9. findings, contd. 2
• The tacit knowledge (Process/practice related)
• The way you learn to walk and take walking for granted, many reporters learn their craft through
newsroom socialization. Rather than strictly following professional norms, values and codes, you
learn to follow the unwritten code inside your newsroom walls
• Some hard questions (Profession related)
• Attachment -- detachment (Lenin is dead, he said), the bureaucratic intrigue (e.g. contacts,
sources, spin –normal: reporter calls source), Who to ask what about what, what the world is and
how it gets reported, news is about matters of public interest (ok, but news values prize violence
and conflict – if it bleeds, it leads), creative possibilities (e.g. universal-particular, conventionwastebasket), etc
• Desires of the craft (Process/practice related)
• Tell news stories in a compelling manner, engage the people, help inform, entertain, educate, etc
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10. findings, contd. 3
• The performance ritual (Structure and influence related)
• Roles: Both newsroom actors and news actors performed roles that bore on how the
reporters worked
• Rules: Reporters internalized a set of rules as to how to gather and write news stories. They
were not always explicit and rigid. Journalists invoked conventions to justify their claims
about why they do what they do
• Routines: Reporters go about doing their work as a routine activity
• Resources: How equipped reporters are to do their job, their readily available intellectual and
physical resources affects the news process
• Attributes of informants
• Educated, Brahmin, male, median age 30’s, informed the observant participation
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11. findings, contd. 4
• From MFN surveys
HIGHLIGHTS
• Attributes of Nepali journalists:
• Mostly young, educated male, Brahmin-Chhetri background, urban, semi-urban, and still largely
print-based
• They earned low to moderate income. Most worked full-time, a majority in the private sector media
• Perceptions of media credibility:
• Majority of journalists see the media and their content generally trustworthy but
partisan. Poor language and presentation style (Resource/resourcefulness) hampering
credibility
• Code violation mainly due to lack of awareness about ethics
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12. findings, contd. 5
• The constraints
• External (From literature review and MFN surveys)
• Nature of democracy, state policy, economy, organizational structure, information
needs of society, cultural tastes, etc.
• Social perception of journalists as politically biased, inadequate security to journalists from the
state, political partisanship and institutional bias of media houses, lack of technological
resources and training for individual journalists
• Internal (observant participation, 2002):
• The R’s -- Roles (general, special topic), Rules (one, many or no sources),
Routines/Rituals (finds news or news finds) and Resources (specialist, generalist,
language facility, walks to where events happen or flies to, the money he spends on
news, etc
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13. The needs, example
• Need for capacity development
• 55% indicate lack of professional satisfaction despite some training. Many
prefer in-house training and internships.
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14. Two studies, one typicality
• Typical respondent
• Typical response
• Young (below 35), educated,
Brahmin, male journalist from
urban or semi-urban location,
with low to moderate income
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• Constrained by structures, lack
of environment, incentive and
prospects for growth of
professional journalists and
media houses
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15. Conclusion
• RESOURCEFULNESS: Despite constraints, TRN journalists go about their jobs in a routine
manner, their tacit knowledge guiding what they actually do. Some have enough
resourcefulness, if not enough resources, to set examples of overcoming the constraints
to produce great stories (e.g. Manmohan). (observant participation, 2002)
• RESOURCEFULNESS: Journalists across clusters, sexes, education levels, study areas,
beats, and media ownership types, going beyond basic training, stressed on hands-on
proficiency and advanced/specialized training, time management, ICT skills, critical
thinking skills, and language skills. (Survey assessments, 2012)
• SYNTHESIS: The two studies are about a persistent journalistic condition in which all
professionals show the desire to get equipped with resources or resourcefulness, to be
able to write good stories, be it by way of self-reflection, training, or education, despite
the social, political, organizational, conventional and cultural rules and constraints of
various degrees and intensities
• CAUTION: This cursory synthesis of a work in progress needs further reading and
refinement -- THANKS
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