Speaker: Jennifer Grogan
Notes Scott Powell
Discussion Leader: Alexandra Sanders
After hearing Jen Grogan talk about her career as a military beat writer and her experiences overseas, Alexandra started her discussion by raising the question of how many people in the class would consider going into war reporting. Katie said she would be interested in this line of work. She mentioned that she loves the danger aspect of the assignment, and believed that military operations are not covered all the time and that should change.
Beren stepped into the discussion by pointing out that he was in the military, and he felt that war reporting does not focus on people involved. They (reporters) take party lines, and don’t always tell the truth.
Professor Dufresne jumped into the conversation by telling the class that there were two people in the class that were in the military and asked about personal experiences with war reporters. Scott mentioned that when he was in the army he was instructed on how to answer questions from reporters while on military assignments in the Middle East. He told the class that there were certain things that soldiers just couldn’t talk about with reporters.
Alex then asked if leaving information out would deter people from doing war reporting. One student said that it should not because there is a priority to reporting during a war. Alexandra also asked if there is a biased opinion with reporters on military assignments. Erin said that information would get omitted for certain reasons that protect the soldiers. Katie said that she found it weird that Jennifer Grogan did not have to omit a lot, and that maybe she was not in the heavier locations of the war.
A few students agreed with Katie’s comments. One student told the class that lack of access was hurting Jennifer’s stories. There was too much happiness in them, and did not think there were enough stories on the heavier things.
Alexandra then asked the class if Jennifer’s war coverage boosted readership. Professor Dufresne jumped into the conversation once again by saying that Jennifer’s stories did help readership, and that her stories had more coverage than any other local paper would do. Brendan thought that Jennifer depended on the military, and had to comply, therefore the stories were not really her own.
Alexandra went on to ask the class if there was a human element to her war reporting when she had to hide words such as “prison”. One student responded by saying that if she was overseas longer and reader’s looked at her blog that people would have more idea of what camp Bucca was really like. Beren and another student argued that Jennifer was not overseas to cover hard, war news stories. Professor Dufresne also mentioned that with Jennifer’s blogging, she used them as an informal notebook, and not for opinion based blogging. He also said that in Journalism, opinion blogging is over emphasized.
Alexandra then switched to a different topic. She asked the class how they would react to the ethical concerns that Jennifer faced in her reporting, with receiving or not receiving gifts. Jennifer mentioned in her speech that she was offered tickets to an inauguration but had to decline. She also said that while she was overseas, she sat in on a meal with Pakistan leaders and was told that she needed to accept a plate during the occasion, so that she did not offend anyone. One student felt that there was no issue with how Jennifer handled her ethical situations; it was good that she didn’t accept anything. Another student mentioned that it was ok for Jennifer to accept meals to fit in with the culture, and it helped her understand her subjects, which was a good way to know people. Alex agreed.
Alex went into the topic of newspapers going online. She raised the question to the class if that was a good thing for the future. Patrick responded by saying that he felt online newspapers were good for the industry. He mentioned that it is more interactive and accessible for people over the printed version of the newspaper.
Professor Dufresne said that if the paper goes online and replaces print, less people would subscribe. He said that newspapers have many needs and that should not be damaged. People would have to make a transition that they would not be in favor for to watching media online.
TAKE AWAY CARDS:
Jesse Grab: It was interesting that Jen’s calm demeanor kept up through her entire presentation including the more intense parts about war.
Beren Jones: Grad school can be used to learn about writing to reporting quickly in place of the time in a newsroom.
Amy Lockmiller: When asked about our occupation in Iraq, Grogan said, “My opinion doesn’t really matter. It’s not going to change anything.” That really stood out to me. As a part of the media she has the opportunity to be such a powerful voice, should she choose to speak her mind openly.
Alex Sanders: I thought it was very interesting hearing from a woman in the warzone. It was very enlightening.
Mike Northup: War reporting is in a different climate now that soldiers and officers can read the stories and confront the reporter as soon as the stories go up.
Eli Pearlstein: The ability of the military to censor coverage by media, reporters can definitely create challenging ethical decisions.
Scott Powell: Embedded reporters with the military overseas is a good idea for overall exposure of the activities going on during wartime, but a reporter will never get the true opinions in most subject matter from soldiers.
Alyssa Carroll: It’s great to see how far Jennifer has gone towards breaking into a predominantly male beat. However, it’s disheartening to hear of the numerous restrictions still placed on her as in the case of the submarine stay.
Emily Abbate: The biggest thing that I took away from Grogan’s talk was that I truly feel the graduate schooling paid off for her. Her writing style is very well developed and it seems like she was very successful at what she does.
Erin O’Toole: I thought Jennifer’s talk was very interesting reporting in Iraq was very impressive. I wondered how she kept her opinions out of the story after actually living through what the soldiers did.
Britton Taylor: I thought it was really interesting how Jennifer was able to stay in Iraq for three weeks and write such interesting stories.
Patrick Swindler: Her experiences and insight into the Iraq countryside was very interesting. I enjoyed reading her articles and listening to her stories about the camp.
Unknown: As someone who is interested in covering war zones, I thought she had a lot of good info.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I think Grogan provided a good example of how a specialization isn't always something you have to prepare for as an undergrad, it can present itself at some point as a job opening that is up for grabs. I think taking a leap turned out great for her, and I might consider expanding my idea of what I'd be willing to write about, since it could work out well as it did for her. I hadn't considered military reporting before as both of my brothers are in the military, but after her talk I thought I might reconsider since she didn't have to embed in a combat zone (she had to argue to do so), which is my major objection to military reporting, I don't want to do that. Being on a base though could be fun and interesting.
ReplyDelete