Narrative, The Soul of Journalism

This week we had a fantastic speaker at our weekly specialized journalism luncheon, Celeste Freemon, who teaches literary journalism at UC Irvine and is a Senior Fellow for Social Justice/New Media at the USC Institute for Justice and Journalism. She spoke about the relevance of narrative journalism in the digital age. As I listened to Freemon describe the importance of narrative in a time of great change in the media and society, I was moved. In our discussion I found the answer to a question I had been asking myself for some time; how can I have the most impact as a journalist? I believe it is through a combination of the oldest form of story telling and the most cutting edge technology offered by the internet. At Annenberg I've discovered my passion for social justice journalism. I'm interested in how we can use literary tricks to draw the masses into stories they might ordinarily avoid, compelling American's to care more about international news. Narratives ask us to invest in characters. In the case of narrative journalism those characters are real live people. Wouldn't it be great if we could use the techniques of narrative storytelling to mobilize people to act on issues like the genocide in Darfur? Some journalists are doing this, but it takes an investment of time and money to do these types of stories and an experienced, skillful storyteller. Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times and Ann Curry of NBC have both done their best to convey the stories of ordinary people in Darfur. Ms. Curry recently accompanied Mr. Kristof to Darfur to report on the ongoing genocide. I found out about this through Krisof's blog, 'On the Ground.' My question is, can citizen journalists really do this type of reporting ... the kind that moves us to tears, that helps us hope, that makes us angry enough or inspired enough to act, or to pressure our government to act? I searched the web for citizen journalism about Darfur -- serious journalism, but I couldn't find any. I expect that's because it's very difficult for someone without the resources and the know-how to do such work. Citizen journalism sites such as Huffington Post simply post links to articles about Darfur. Demotix offers still photos and a short text description of them. This is not storytelling. Compare that to Curry's reports and judge for yourself.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy