UQ in Vietnam: Teaching journalism students foreign correspondence

The University of Queensland has developed Work Integrated Learning (WIL) courses for groups of 10 students at a time to travel to Vietnam to engage in intercultural learning and working as foreign correspondents for a dedicated UQ multimedia website. Their radio, television, print and photojournalism reports have also been made available to media around the world under Creative Commons arrangements. This article reports on the students' experience in both WIL courses where they were exposed to intensive, immerse and experiential teaching and coaching by a lecturer (the researcher who is a former foreign correspondent for the ABC) and two tutors with expertise in editorial and technical production.

Global journalism investigations in the digital age: Connections and collaborations

Investigative journalists who join what theorist Manuel Castells describes as the ‘network society’ can locate potential news sources using various social media platforms and interview them using Web-based communication technologies. The potential for journalistic investigations involving multi-directional conversations with news sources across the globe is beginning to be explored. Potential news sources who are part of the network society have unprecedented access to specialist investigative reporters irrespective of their location and can speak to them more cost effectively than in the past. This paper explores how new journalism technologies are allowing journalists to call powerful individuals and institutions to account, irrespective of national borders; and how previously silenced individuals are being given a voice. To read an example of international investigative journalism facilitated by a combination of social media, Web-based communications, reporter collaboration and news outlet collaborations see http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/churchs-wall-of-silence-on-sexual-abuse/story-e6frg6z6-1226639077238.

Scripted drama: The long wait for football to be taken seriously as a literary subject

This article is a work of non-fiction which draws on my research in football fiction.

Working the story : News curation in social media as a second save of citizen journalism

For the first decade of its existence, the concept of citizen journalism has described an approach which was seen as a broadening of the participant base in journalistic processes, but still involved only a comparatively small subset of overall society – for the most part, citizen journalists were news enthusiasts and “political junkies” (Coleman, 2006) who, as some exasperated professional journalists put it, “wouldn’t get a job at a real newspaper” (The Australian, 2007), but nonetheless followed many of the same journalistic principles. The investment – if not of money, then at least of time and effort – involved in setting up a blog or participating in a citizen journalism Website remained substantial enough to prevent the majority of Internet users from engaging in citizen journalist activities to any significant extent; what emerged in the form of news blogs and citizen journalism sites was a new online elite which for some time challenged the hegemony of the existing journalistic elite, but gradually also merged with it. The mass adoption of next-generation social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, however, has led to the emergence of a new wave of quasi-journalistic user activities which now much more closely resemble the “random acts of journalism” which JD Lasica envisaged in 2003. Social media are not exclusively or even predominantly used for citizen journalism; instead, citizen journalism is now simply a by-product of user communities engaging in exchanges about the topics which interest them, or tracking emerging stories and events as they happen. Such platforms – and especially Twitter with its system of ad hoc hashtags that enable the rapid exchange of information about issues of interest – provide spaces for users to come together to “work the story” through a process of collaborative gatewatching (Bruns, 2005), content curation, and information evaluation which takes place in real time and brings together everyday users, domain experts, journalists, and potentially even the subjects of the story themselves. Compared to the spaces of news blogs and citizen journalism sites, but also of conventional online news Websites, which are controlled by their respective operators and inherently position user engagement as a secondary activity to content publication, these social media spaces are centred around user interaction, providing a third-party space in which everyday as well as institutional users, laypeople as well as experts converge without being able to control the exchange. Drawing on a number of recent examples, this article will argue that this results in a new dynamic of interaction and enables the emergence of a more broadly-based, decentralised, second wave of citizen engagement in journalistic processes.

Voice, deliberation, resistance and persuasion through networked journalism

The pervasive use of the World Wide Web by the general population has created a cultural shift in “our living world”. It has enabled more people to share more information about more events and issues in the world than was possible before its general use. As a consequence, it has transformed traditional news media’s approach to almost every aspect of journalism, with many organisations restructuring their philosophy and practice to include a variety of participatory spaces/forums where people are free to engage in deliberative dialogue about matters of public importance. Moreover, while news media were the traditional gatekeepers of information, today many organisations allow, to different degrees, the general public and other independent journalism entities to participate in the news production process, which may include agenda setting and content production. This paper draws from an international collective case study that showcases various approaches to networked online news journalism. It examines the ways in which different traditional news media models use digital tools and technologies for participatory communication of information about matters of public interest. The research finds differences between the ways in which public service, commercial and independent news media give voice to the public and ultimately their approach to journalism’s role as the Fourth Estate––one of the key institutions of democracy. The work is framed by the notion that journalism in democratic societies has a key role in ensuring citizens are informed and engaged with public affairs. An examination of four media models, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), the Guardian, News Limited and OhmyNews, showcases the various approaches to networked online news journalism and how each provides different avenues for citizen empowerment. The cases are described and analysed in the context of their own social, political and economic setting. Semi-structured in-depth interviews with key senior journalists and editors provide specific information on comparisons between the distinctive practices of their own organisation. In particular these show how the ideal of democracy can be used as a tool of persuasion as much as a method of deliberation.

Pacific Journalism Review : Twenty years on the front line of regional identity and freedom

Pacific Journalism Review has consistently, at a good standard, honoured its 1994 founding goal: to be a credible peer-reviewed journal in the Asia-Pacific region, probing developments in journalism and media, and supporting journalism education. Global, it considers new media and social movements; ‘regional’, it promotes vernacular media, human freedoms and sustainable development. Asking how it developed, the method for this article was to research the archive, noting authors, subject matter, themes. The article concludes that one answer is the journal’s collegiate approach; hundreds of academics, journalists and others, have been invited to contribute. Second has been the dedication of its one principal editor, Professor David Robie, always somehow providing resources—at Port Moresby, Suva, and now Auckland—with a consistent editorial stance. Eclectic, not partisan, it has nevertheless been vigilant over rights, such as monitoring the Fiji coups d’etat. Watching through a media lens, it follows a ‘Pacific way’, handling hard information through understanding and consensus. It has 237 subscriptions indexed to seven databases. Open source, it receives more than 1000 site visits weekly. With ‘clientele’ mostly in Australia, New Zealand and ‘Oceania’, it extends much further afield. From 1994 to 2014, 701 articles and reviews were published, now more than 24 scholarly articles each year.

Australian journalism students’ professional views and news consumption: Results from a representative study

Journalism education’s role in shaping students’ professional views has been a topic of interest among scholars for the past decade in particular. Increasing numbers of studies are concerned with examining students’ backgrounds and views in order to identify what role exposure to the tertiary environment may play in socializing them into the industry. This study reports on the results of the largest survey of Australian journalism students undertaken to date, with a sample size of 1884 students. The study finds that time spent studying journalism appears to be related to changes in role perceptions and news consumption. Final-year students are significantly more likely to support journalism’s watchdog role and to reject consumer-oriented and ‘loyal’ roles. They also consume more news than first-year students. On the other hand, journalism education appears to have little impact on views of controversial practices, with only marginal differences between final- and first-year students.

Combining detached watchdog journalism with development ideals: An exploration of Fijian journalism culture

Development journalism has been a key focus of discussion among journalism scholars for around half a decade, but most of the attention has been firmly on African and Asian countries. This paper examines the situation on the little-researched island nation of Fiji, which has experienced considerable political instability since independence in 1970. Based on interviews with 77 of the country’s small population of just over 100 journalists, we find that journalism in Fiji exhibits similarities to Western journalism ideals, but also a significant development journalism orientation. A comparison with six other countries from the global South shows that this mix is not unique, and we argue that Western journalism approaches and development ideals are not by necessity mutually exclusive, as has often been argued. In this way, the article aims to contribute to a reassessment of our understanding of development journalism and how journalists in developing societies view their work.

The non-literary Latin letters. A study of their syntax and pragmatics

This dissertation studies the language of Latin letters that were written in Egypt and Vindolanda (in northern Britain) during the period 1st century BC 3rd century AD on papyri, ostraca, and wooden tablets. The majority of the texts is, in one way or another, connected with the Roman army. The focus of the study is on syntax and pragmatics. Besides traditional philological methods, modern syntactic theory is used as well, especially in the pragmatic analysis. The study begins with a critical survey of certain concepts that are current in the research on the Latin language, most importantly the concept of vulgar Latin , which, it is argued, seems to be used as an abstract noun for variation and change in Latin . Further, it is necessary to treat even the non-literary material primarily as written texts and not as straightforward reflections of spoken language. An examination of letter phraseology shows that there is considerable variation between the two major geographical areas of provenance. Latin letter writing in Egypt was influenced by Greek. The study highlights the importance of seeing the letters as a text type, with recurring phraseological elements appearing in the body text as well. It is argued that recognising these elements is essential for the correct analysis of the syntax. Three areas of syntax are discussed in detail: sentence connection (mainly parataxis), syntactically incoherent structures and word order (the order of the object and the verb). For certain types of sentence connection we may plausibly posit an origin in spoken Latin, but for many other linguistic phenomena attested in this material the issue of spoken Latin is anything but simple. Concerning the study of historical syntax, the letters offer information about the changing status of the accusative case. Incoherent structures may reflect contaminations in spoken language but usually the reason for them is the inability of the writer to put his thoughts into writing, especially when there is something more complicated to be expressed. Many incoherent expressions reflect the need to start the predication with a thematic constituent. Latin word order is seen as resulting from an interaction of syntactic and pragmatic factors. The preference for an order where the topic is placed sentence-initially can be seen in word order more generally as well. Furthermore, there appears a difference between Egypt and Vindolanda. The letters from Vindolanda show the order O(bject) V(erb) clearly more often than the letters from Egypt. Interestingly, this difference correlates with another, namely the use of the anaphoric pronoun is. This is an interesting observation in view of the fact that both of these are traditional Latin features, as opposed to those that foreshadow the Romance development (VO order and use of the anaphoric ille). However, it is difficult to say whether this is an indication of social or regional variation.

"Do Not Celebrate Your Feast without Your Neighbours" : A Study of References to Feasts and Festivals in Non-Literary Documents from Ramesside Period Deir el-Medina

This dissertation is a study of the forms and functions of feasts and feasting in the ancient Egyptian village of Deir el-Medina in Thebes (modern Luxor). This particular village, during the New Kingdom (c. 1550 1069 BC), was inhabited by the men (and their families) who constructed the Royal Tombs in the Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens. The royal artisans were probably more literate than the average Egyptians and the numerous Ramesside Period (c. 1295 1069 BC) non-literary texts found in the excavations of the village and its surroundings form the source material for this study. In this study, the methods used are mainly Egyptological and the references to feasts and feasting are considered in view of what is known of New Kingdom Egypt, Thebes, and Deir el-Medina. Nevertheless, it is the use of the methodological concept local vernacular religion that has resulted in the division of the research findings into two sections, i.e., references to feasts celebrated both in and outside the community and other references to feasts and feasting in the village. When considering the function of the feasts celebrated at Deir el-Medina, a functional approach to feasts introduced by anthropologists and archaeologists is utilized. The Deir el-Medina feasts which were associated with the official religion form a festival calendar of feasts celebrated annually on the same civil calendar day. The reconstructed festival calendar of Deir el-Medina reflects the feasts celebrated around Thebes or, at least, in Western Thebes. The function of the nationally and regionally observed feasts (which, at least at Deir el-Medina, resulted in a work-free day) may have been to keep people content so that they would continue to work which was to the advantage of the king and the elite surrounding him. Local feasts appear to have been observed more irregularly at Deir el-Medina or perhaps according to the lunar calendar. Feasts celebrated by the community as a whole served to maintain the unity of the group. In addition to feasts celebrated by the entire community, the inhabitants of Deir el-Medina could mark their own personal feasts and organize small gatherings during public feasts. Through such feasts, an individual man might form alliances and advance his chances of a favourable marriage or of acquiring a position on the work crew.

The Duet between the Author and the Translator: An Analysis of Style through Shifts in Literary Translation

The study proposes a method for identifying the personal imprint of literary translators in translated works of fiction. The initial assumption was that the style of a target text is not determined solely by the literary style of the author but also by features of its translator s idiolect. A method was developed for identifying the idiolectal features of individual translators, which were then used to describe personal translation styles. The method is not restricted to a particular language pair. To test the method and to establish the nature of the proposed personal imprint empirically, extracts from four English-language literary source texts (two novels by James Joyce and two by Ernest Hemingway) were first compared with their translations into Finnish (by four different translators) in order to identify changes, or shifts, that had taken place at the formal linguistic level in the translation process. To allow individual propensities to manifest themselves, only optional shifts in which the translators had a range of choices available to them were included in the study. In the second phase, extracts by different authors rendered into Finnish by the same translator were compared in order to gauge the extent of the potential impact of the author's style on the translator's work. In-depth analysis of the types of shifts made most frequently by the individual translators revealed further intersubjective differences, and the shifts were used to construct translation profiles for each of the translators. In order to determine the potential effects of frequently occurring shifts on the target text, some central concepts of narratology were adapted and used to establish an intermediate link between microlevel choices and macrolevel effects. In this way the propensity of an individual translator to opt for certain types of shift could be linked with the overall artistic effect of the target text.

Voice, deliberation, resistance and persuasion through participatory journalism business models

The pervasive use of the World Wide Web by the general population has created a cultural shift throughout the world. It has enabled more people to share more information about more events and issues than was possible before its general use. As a consequence, it has transformed traditional news media’s approach to almost every aspect of journalism, with many organisations restructuring their philosophy and practice to include a variety of participatory spaces/forums where people are free to engage in deliberative dialogue about matters of public importance. This paper draws from an international collective case study that showcases various approaches to participatory online news journalism during the period 1997–2011 (Adams, 2013). The research finds differences in the ways in which public service, commercial, and independent news media give voice to the public, and ultimately in their approach to journalism’s role as the Fourth Estate––one of the key institutions of democracy. The work is framed by the notion that journalism in democratic societies has a crucial role in ensuring citizens are informed and engaged with public affairs. An examination of four media models, OhmyNews International, News Corp Australia (formerly News Limited), the Guardian and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), showcases the various approaches to participatory online news journalism and how each provides different avenues for citizen engagement. Semistructured in-depth interviews with some of the key senior journalists and editors provide specific information on comparisons between the distinctive practices in each of their employer organisations.

From Iron Horse to Rauta-airot - a Semiotic View on the Domestication of Metaphors in Literary Translation

The thesis concentrates on two questions: the translation of metaphors in literary texts, and the use of semiotic models and tools in translation studies. The aim of the thesis is to present a semiotic, text based model designed to ease the translation of metaphors and to analyze translated metaphors. In the translation of metaphors I will concentrate on the central problem of metaphor translations: in addition to its denotation and connotation, a single metaphor may contain numerous culture or genre specific meanings. How can a translator ensure the translation of all meanings relevant to the text as a whole? I will approach the question from two directions. Umberto Eco's holistic text analysis model provides an opportunity to concentrate on the problematic nature of metaphor translation from the level of a text as a specific entity, while George Lakoff's and Mark Johnson's metaphor research makes it possible to approach the question from the level of individual metaphors. On the semiotic side, the model utilizes Eero Tarasti's existential semiotics supported by Algirdas Greimas' actant model and Yuri Lotman's theory of cultural semiotics. In the model introduced in the thesis, individual texts are deconstructed through Eco's model into elements. The textual roles and features of these elements are distilled further through Tarasti's model into their coexistent meaning levels. The priorization and analysis of these meaning levels provide an opportunity to consider the contents and significance of specific metaphors in relation to the needs of the text as a whole. As example texts, I will use Motörhead's hard rock classic Iron Horse/Born to Lose and its translation into Rauta-airot by Viikate. I will use the introduced model to analyze the metaphors in the source and target texts, and to consider the transfer of culture specific elements between the languages and cultural borders. In addition, I will use the analysis process to examine the validity of the model introduced in the thesis.

A Literary Turn : Rethinking the Roles of Generalization and Theory in Anglo-American Moral Philosophy

This work investigates the role of narrative literature in late-20th century and contemporary Anglo-American moral philosophy. It aims to show the trend of reading narrative literature for purposes of moral philosophy from the 1970 s and early 80 s to the present day as a part of a larger movement in Anglo-American moral philosophy, and to present a view of its significance for moral philosophy overall. Chapter 1 provides some preliminaries concerning the view of narrative literature which my discussion builds on. In chapter 2 I give an outline of how narrative literature is considered in contemporary Anglo-American moral philosophy, and connect this use to the broad trend of neo-Aristotelian ethics in this context. In chapter 3 I connect the use of literature to the idea of the non-generalizability of moral perception and judgment, which is central to the neo-Aristotelian trend, as well as to a range of moral particularisms and anti-theoretical positions of late 20th century and contemporary ethics. The joint task of chapters 2 and 3 is to situate the trend of reading narrative literature for the purposes of moral philosophy in the present context of moral philosophy. In the following two chapters, 4 and 5, I move on from the particularizing power of narrative literature, which is emphasized by neo-Aristotelians and particularists alike, to a broader under-standing of the intellectual potential of narrative literature. In chapter 4 I argue that narrative literature has its own forms of generalization which are enriching for our understanding of the workings of ethical generalizations in philosophy. In chapter 5 I discuss Iris Murdoch s and Martha Nussbaum s respective ways of combining ethical generality and particularity in a philosophical framework where both systematic moral theory and narrative literature are taken seriously. In chapter 6 I analyse the controversy between contemporary anti-theoretical conceptions of ethics and Nussbaum s refutation of these. I present my suggestion for how the significance of the ethics/literature discussion for moral philosophy can be understood if one wants to overcome the limitations of both Nussbaum s theory-centred, equilibrium-seeking perspective, and the anti-theorists repudiation of theory. I call my position the inclusive approach .