Best 

Dan

http://jou.sagepub.com/content/early/2011/05/27/1464884911400843.abstract

This is interesting but the timing of the interviews makes it more of a snapshot of attitudes before the mainstreaming of social media. It reflects the research (yet to be published) I did in 2007/8 involving qualitative interviews with Australian producers/presenters on Australian talk radio.

But in my more recent PhD research (drawing on surveys/interviews with journalists conducted across a timeline from early 2009-end 2011), I’m finding ‘audience’ engagement through platforms like Twitter is altering journalistic approaches to editorial power.

I’m writing a PhD thesis called the Twitterisation of Journalism. My objective is to track the change and its impact. And one of the biggest challenges will be making it as up to date as possible @ submission in a dramatically changing online world!

I look forward to reading your book!

Cheers,

Julie Posetti
University of Canberra

That said, when I came into academia, I did find myself getting frustrated at the way sometimes relatively simple ideas were written in what appeared to be a deliberately obtuse style. I wonder if some writers aim to make their academic field their exclusive preserve, shrouding it in a veneer of faux intellectual phraseology. As a result, some new to academia can feel intimidated and excluded from the club (I certainly did) or are left feeling frustrated, or suspicious that the ‘bleeding obvious’ or shallow is being stated, but in a ‘fancy’ way. I resisted doing research because I felt I could not master this style.

I have since learned differently, and one way to get over this is to collaborate with a more experienced academic (who writes well) and to hold your nerve. I did my first piece of research with Tony Harcup on news values. One of the peer reviewers at the time criticised our paper as being ‘too journalistic’ in style. I wavered. Tony said ‘good’. We didn’t change the style. It has since gone on to be one of the most frequently accessed articles in Journalism Studies.

I firmly believe that most ideas should be explained as clearly and eloquently as possible, and that anyone publishing has a duty to communicate effectively. That doesn’t mean that all concepts or ideas are as easy to ‘get’ as others, but this does not necessarily mean they are less worthwhile (even if some of my students want to give up at first post with anything outside their comfort zone). By the way, I’ve read Tony and Mick’s books, and they are very well written and accessible and I use them with my students. I’d better read Barnie’s now.

Some things ARE hard to understand and require more than just scanning the words and knowing how to speak English. Few apparently have managed to get beyond page 23, but please don’t condemn Hawking because ‘Time’ is a difficult concept to explain without some effort and intelligence from the reader.

The impact of ‘post-modern’ thought on our lives is deep and profound and the impact of such ideas on how we regard journalism and its roles is important for any thinking journalist to understand. Yes, many texts are difficult to understand and some are, quite frankly, poorly written and seemingly designed to demonstrate how clever the writer is. The same criticism can be made of some journalism.

And of the books he cites, I know the Hudson & Rowlands book very well. It is clear and well written – and barely pays a passing nod (if that) to important theoretical debates about the role of broadcast journalism. It is a practical text, a ‘how to do’ manual, so to speak. There’s nothing wrong with that – but Barnie needs to make sure his definition of ‘academic’ goes beyond ‘working in’ or ‘writing from’ the universities.

The Sheila Gunn edited book on political journalism he cites as the example for us all to follow contains no theory at all – it’s primarily a collection of tips and stories from practitioners. And as an academic, I don’t ‘hate’ it – quite apart from its practical use to students, it’s potentially a very useful source to illustrate theoretical and conceptual ideas about the role of political journalism.

By the way, I speak as someone who has always tried to make my academic work readable and accessible. But some concepts and ideas are difficult to grasp and can’t be ‘kept simple, stupid’.