Course Title: MFJS 2140, Spring 2012, News Writing and Reporting
Time: Wednesdays 6pm to 9pm
Instructor: John Tomasic
E-mail address: JTomasicDU@gmail.com
Phone: 310-910-5920
Room: Chambers Center 260
Website: mfjsnewswritingspring2012.blogspot.com
Required text:
The Journalist and the Murderer by Janet Malcolm
Optional texts:
Associated Press Style and Libel Manual
(or $25 subscription: http://www.apstylebook.com/?do=product&pid=OLN-917360)
Networked: a History of News in Transition by Adrienne Russell
Course description:
What is a journalist? The answer seems as obvious at first blush as it seems hazy and fragile the closer you look. What's the difference between (1) creating nonfiction or (2) doing news writing or (3) practicing journalism? Are they different genres of work or are they subgenres? Does mastering each of them require different skills? Can you be good at doing one of them and lousy at the others? Is Twitter our post-modern news wire service? If yes, how much would a Twitter-reporter really have to know about the rules of English grammar or AP style? In the digital age, where data crushes in on us from every side, are software-code writers who can artfully visualize information with interactive graphs and charts and linked images the people practicing the best sort of new-media journalism? In the era of collapsing newspapers, the rise of the citizen journalist, the erection of self-selected silos of information and the erosion of objectivity, what "ethics" can be said to proscribe the journalism profession, if indeed it can still credibly be called a "profession" at all?
This course will explore all of those questions through intense practice at reading and writing nonfiction-- short, long, online and offline, the good, the bad and the ugly. In our transitioning media age, this course makes the case for writing, because well-crafted narrative rooted in a commitment to accurate and fair observation and investigation done with an eye trained for what matters still rule in the art of this kind of storytelling, which is what we're really talking about when we talk about news or nonfiction or journalism or any and all of the above.
Course objective:
To teach students how to gather information and to build narratives across genres (or subgenres) that convey information with efficiency and to great effect.
Course structure:
Classes will be a mix of lectures, class discussion, writing and workshops. You will post almost all of your material to the class website. Much but not all of your work will be assigned in two parts: You will turn in drafts and final pieces. Please participate in class. It's a workshop atmosphere.
Assignments:
1. Class blogging: 10 percent
2. Event story: 10 percent
3. Explainer: 10 percent
4. Ten ledes: 15 percent
5. Midterm: 15 percent
6. Profile: 20 percent
7. Investigation: 20 percent
Rough schedule:
March 28: no class
1. April 4: Introduction: What journalists do.
"Disruptions," by Nick Bilton, silly little blog or instructive journalism gem?
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/25/disruptions-tests-cast-doubt-on-fcc-rules-on-kindle-and-ipad-html/?pagewanted=all
Short profile: Who is that sitting next to you?
2. April 11: How 'Do, How-To
The explainer or another name for a journalist
The "view from nowhere": Discussion
3. April 18: *Explainer story due
Discussion on "The Journalist and the Murderer"
"This is happening" or ways to report events.
4. April 25: *Event story due
Cover an event in 400-500 words. Be quick and thorough. Lead with the meat: what happened that was worth noting? Often the "news" of the event makes itself clear. Sometimes it doesn't. Tip: As the event is happening, think of the headline you'll put on your story. Your headline may change once or twice or many times during the course of the event. Your story has to make good on the headline and also include all relevant "who what why where" data, including short titles or other helpful descriptors of the people involved. (Optional: upload photo)
Discussion on "The Journalist and the Murderer"
5. May 2: *In-Class Midterm: On "the view from nowhere" and Janet Malcolm
6. May 9: Ledes!
"The man in the fifth row by the window must have been sick, because he was sweating and mumbling softly in a feverish way. Anyway, that's what the other United Airlines passengers thought. Then he stood up screaming and opened his shirt."
On profiles
7. May 16: *In class assignment: Ten Ledes
Investigative reporting
8. May 23: *2,000 to 3,000-word profiles due
Your investigations: a progress report; class critiques
9. May 30: *Investigations: draft due
