Journalism

The journalism is the activity which consists to collect, gather, check and comment on facts to carry them for submission to the Public through the Média.

Different the media are today: the Written press where the professionals apply Techniques of writing journalistic, the radio where journalism uses the radio writing, the Télévision by the diffusion of assemblies vidéos with accompanying notes, and Internet. The News agency is added to it, which provides in information the subscribed draftings. One counts three great news agencies general practitioners in the world: AFP (France); Reuters (Great Britain); Associated Press (E. - U.).

The journalism of investigation treats the facts whose collection can be blocked by thirds interested in their not-disclosure, or which the studied subject claims a work of long and complex stepping. The recent facts constitute the Actualité.

The journalism of topicality relates to mainly the radio, the Télévision, the daily Written press and Internet. It is a question of reporting the recent events. The journalists seek to obtain information of exclusiveness (called scoop in the jargon of the trade). It ensures the reputation of the media for which the journalist works.

The great report consists in carrying out an in-depth survey at the time of the wars or the historical great events. He is generally regarded as the noblest activity of journalism.

Journalism can be specialized in a particular field, like journalism political, sporting, scientific, society man, etc

Journalistic information

Here two definitions, one concretes, the other theoretical one:

  • In France, in the practical , press information is concretely defined:

    • by the structure which carries out and disseminates this information. Information is a data diffused by an press agency, i.e. an organization having a number allotted under certain conditions by a Joint committee (State/press barons): periodicity, effective sale, a third of information to character of general interest.
    • by the professional which writes it, the journalist (law the labor governed by the national Collective agreement of the journalists; chart of press) which can call upon a clause of conscience in certain cases. To obtain his chart (nonobligatory), renewable every year, the journalist must prove that it gains more than 50% of his incomes in “wages presses”. The journalist is also author and, for this reason, guard of the rights on his productions.

  • In the theory , an democratic society, press information is:

    • a data of topicality and general interest (given significant universally or collectively taken in the facts and events of the present or having a significance for time present)
    • selected and formatted
    • by a free conscience , formed with research not involved in the truth and concerned of the community property
    • and diffused by media guaranteeing independence of the journalist compared to any capacity (political, ideological or economic, including compared to the interests of the company which employs it when there is a democratic stake of information).
In theory always, the journaliste/le media can of course be committed : it must then always respect the facts, aim at the general interest and clearly expose the terms of its party taken.

Ethical rules of journalism

See also: Deontology of journalism

In France, the journalists are supposed to obey deontologic rules whose interpretation is prone to polemic. In fact, the joint committee which delivers the charts of press (CCIJP) does not found its decisions according to the respect by the journalist of a professional ethics charter. This commission requires just candidates to have gained more than 50% of their incomes of a intellectual treatment of the topicality during the previous year.

Journalism is sometimes called “Fourth capacity” for the role of transparency which it is supposed to have within a Démocratie.

As example, the Charon report/ratio given to the French ministry of the Culture and Communication in June 1998 gave a report on the reflections of the Regional Weekly press. As regards deontology, he recommended:

  • To publish information of quality
    • honest and respectful of the truth
    • collected without recourse to unfair processes
    • founded on checked facts
    • presented in good faith
    • impartial, i.e. presenting the various aspects of a situation
  • To defend the freedom of the information
    • while taking care of its independence with regard to all the capacities
    • by exerting its critical spirit, which forces to doubt all methodically
    • while clearly distinguishing information from the messages of communication or publicity
  • Respecter the people
    • by respecting the human dignity
    • by showing compassion for the people struck by misfortune
    • by respecting the intimacy of the private life
    • by publishing any legitimate request for right of reply
    • while recognizing and by rectifying its errors
  • To promote freedom of expression
    • by taking into account the observations of its readers
    • by prohibiting any speech of incentive to hatred or discrimination
  • To reinforce the values which found the democracy
    • while continuing, in the publication of information, a goal legitimates taking into consideration right of the reader to be informed
    • by not neglecting a priori any information of proximity in all the fields of the life social
    • by having the concern of informing, by information and the comment, the judgment of the citizen on all the aspects of the political news and general
    • by showing equity, to consider all the equal citizens in front of the press as they is it in front of the law

This same report/ratio gave a report on professional rules requiring that the editor of regional weekly press commit himself taking care that its journalists:

  • checks their source S;

  • does not use of unfair methods;
  • does not pay any remuneration with the people who agree to be information sources;
  • publishes only information, proven and precise, whose origin is known, by accompanying them if necessary by the reserve which is essential;
  • avoids perceiving some advantage that it is because of the publication or the not-publication of information;
  • informs the people not very familiar with the press who their remarks could be diffused, and thus made available of many people;
  • remains critical with regard to the searchings with the unfolding of which the police force invites the journalists;
  • does not accept any instruction of an advertiser;
  • does not accept gifts that if they directly serve the achievement of journalistic work;
  • refuses all pressures and accept other editorial directives only that of the editor or persons in charge of the drafting;
  • does not subject a report to the sources before its publication;
  • shows respect with regard to the people who have just lived a drama, while avoiding badgering them to obtain information;
  • prohibits calumny and the charges without base;
  • refuses to nourish and amplify the rumor, even if other supports were already made the echo of it;
  • takes care in the choice of their photographs not to induce a presumption of culpability by the image;
  • processes the data, including the various facts, without seeking the sensationnalism;
  • ensures the follow-up of information published;
  • respects the direction of the reported remarks accurately;
  • locates the facts and opinions in their context, without exaggerating some or decreasing the range by it;
  • decides between carefully what raises:
    • of factual information,
    • of the analysis
    • and the personal opinion
  • collects the point of view of all the people blamed in a business and, when one of them refuses with any declaration, the readers
inform some

Practices and principles of journalism

Paid such as it is, a fact is not always sufficient. Thus in the schools of journalism, one regularly quotes the advertisement which would have had to be made to comment on the walk of César on Rome: “Did César and its legions cross Rubicon” or “César and its legions crossed Rubicon, the Republic is in danger”?

Another anecdote allotted to an editor association the following instructions: “A sentence is composed of a subject, a verb and a complement. If you put an adverb, you are transfered! For the adjectives… consult me! ”

The Infotainment , a new editorial style mixing information and entertainment is often criticized like a relaxation of the journalistic method with the risk to feed confusion between investigations and spectacles, even between journalism and Propagande. This risk is all the more great as the journalists are more and more often confronted with experts in Communication who are charged to present reality under one day favorable to their silent partner. It thus becomes more difficult to obtain not filtered information coming from a neutral source.

Any journalist worthy of this name must respect a principle of objectivity, by imposing a critical distance between the facts and his own interpretation of the facts. The journalists agree that it is impossible to lead to a total objectivity in the treatment of the topicality. The urgency of the publication, the complexity of the treated facts, the absence of expertise of the journalists general practitioners do not make it possible to guarantee the absolute objectivity of revealed information.

Also ethical rules were installation to limit the drifts. One of them makes the distinction between the factual article (which is restricted to pay made, practical quotations and details) and the leading article. The leading article is an article of comments in which a journalist (often a feather recognized by the profession or the general public) engages by proposing an analysis or an interpretation of the facts which engages only him. The large national and regional newspapers have their appointed leader-writers whose function is not any more to bring back the facts but to propose a reading of it, sometimes directed politically or philosophically.

The leading line of a newspaper, its political orientation and its principles founders appear more under the feather of a leader-writer that in a factual article, which will be restricted to enumerate the facts.

Technical of journalistic writing

  • Why inform?

    • To include/understand the world and to give to the citizens the means of acting
    • Identification with a group given (socioprofessional category, etc)
    • To sensitize, mobilize, alert
    • Entertainment (people, etc)

  • Selection criteria of the articles

    • the innovation (the Topicality)
    • interest (for the reader initially and the community then)
    • the originality

  • the law of proximity

    • temporal (today more than yesterday and much less than tomorrow)
    • geographical (the death-km: a death in my country touches me more than one dead in a foreign country)
    • sociocultural
    • emotional
    • psychological (sex, disease/dead, religion)
    • ideological (always, even when posted neutrality)
    • life practices

  • To know precisely to which one is addressed. To know its public well and the leading line of the newspaper

  • to conceive the message Well to clearly state it
  • To treat on a hierarchical basis information (to privilege the topicality and
  • To choose a precise angle (to avoid the general information or to want all to say on a subject)
  • To write simple and short (to hope the number of signs)
  • To conceive an effective plan
  • To present the copy according to the standards (calibration)
  • To envisage the setting in scene of the text (several reading levels: titles, subtitles, etc)
  • to read again several times (grammar and orthography, comprehension, legibility)

The writing of the text

  • To define the essential message and the precise angle

  • To answer the six key questions: who, what, where, when, how, why?
  • the privileged plan: the pyramid reversed (at least important more important essence initially then)
  • To look after the style, to make short Sentence S
  • different the reading levels: Title S, subtitles, subtitles, Chapô S, Legend S photographs, etc
  • the illustration S

Journalistic kinds

  • informative kinds

    • the short
    • the Net
    • the article
    • the Report
    • the file

  • kinds of comment

    • the leading
    • the Drawing of topicality
    • the critical
    • the chronic
    • the Opinion column

Journalism in France

For historical reasons, the French journalists profit from a particular Fiscalité. In 1934, the government concedes a standard abatement of 30% to them intended to compensate for their professional expenditure that the press companies did not refund. This measurement was renewed the shortly after the Second world war for economic reasons, the State helping in this manner the press companies whose financial health did not make it possible to remunerate the journalists sufficiently. In the Years 1970, the abatement is then reached a maximum with 50.000 francs (7 600 €).

Since 1998, the abatement of 30% decreased regularly to disappear definitively in 2001. N the other hand, the government Jospin granted a “allowance for expenses of employment” to the journalists, who allowed them, in 2006, to decrease by 7.650 euros the amount of their assessed incomes. This reduction constitutes a Tax niche.

Formations of journalism recognized in France

In France, the access to journalism is not subordinated to obtaining a precise diploma. However, the national Collective agreement of work of the journalists affirms “the interest of the contracting parties for professional training and wishes that the beginners receive an mainstream education and technique as complete as possible”. This way, the fact of having satisfied the one of the formations recognized by the profession - and to be titular diploma of end of studies - decreases by half the duration of the training course by two years necessary to reach the titular statute of journalist.

Here a list of the 12 formations recognized by the profession (by the National union of the journalists):

History of journalism

In the Romain Empire the Acta Diurna were posted in public spaces. One published there fact various, new soldiers, death certificates, sporting chronicles… In 1622 Nathaniel Butler founds with London the first weekly magazine: Weekly News . It will be followed to France by the Gazette of Théophraste Renaudot whose first number is published the May 30th 1631.

The October 22nd 1835 Charles-Louis Havas creates the first world News agency: the Agency of the political sheets, general correspondence. It will become in 1944 the Agence France-Press.

In the Années 1920 appear the cinema news, then the first radio operator Reportage S. Suivront, in the Années 1940, the first tv news.

History of journalism in Japan

  • Kawara-round of applause: The ancestor of journalism is equivalent to the troubadour of the European areas. He is the carrier of the news and the stories.

  • December 1862: The shogunat of Tokugawa creates a newspaper (shimbun) to inform the population of the attempts of incursion and opening of Japan by the foreigners.
  • 1868: New newspapers, often pilot by private interests, appear in order to fight single information.
  • 1874: The first Japanese war correspondent, Ginko Kishida, is sent to Taiwan with the troops for the newspaper Tokyo Nichi-Nichi.
  • 1875: 1st law anti-slandering to protect the government and its official from the too virulent attacks. Certain journalists will know the prison.

Various journalistic styles

  • the Photojournalisme

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