27 Reading News Sources: An In Class Exercise
News & Opinion: the two basic categories of news content.
News: The writer reports the news. People’s opinions may appear as part of that reporting (“According to Mr. Smith…”), but the writer does not explicitly present their own views.
Opinion: The writer shares their own views and explicitly seeks to persuade readers to adopt those views as their own.
Gray Areas:
Advocacy reporting: When news is reported from an explicit perspective.
For instance, news articles published in the Humane Society magazine generally support the organization’s larger agenda of promoting humane treatment of animals.
News analysis: news writing that pushes beyond surfaces answers to the 5 W’s and H (Who? What? Where? When? Why? and How?) to explore causes and consequences of news events.
Sub-categories of News and Opinion
| News | ||
| News Article | An article written to inform reads about recent events. The author reports essential information (who/what/where/when/why/how) | |
| News Analysis | An article written to inform readers about recent events. The author reports and attempts to deepen understanding of recent events—for example, by providing background information and other kinds of additional context. | |
| Feature Article |
Compared with news articles, feature articles are often more creative or exploratory and less focused on efficient delivery of essential information. For example, while a news article may detail the most recent revelations about a politician’s extramarital affair, a feature article may offer in-depth reporting on a single aspect of the revelations, or the revelations may function as a “news peg” for the feature article’s more general exploration of infidelity. Other types of news content that are generally categorized as “feature” writing include how-to-do-it articles (for example, how to shop for a new phone) and profiles (for example, an article about a movie actor starring in a recently-released film). |
|
| Opinion | ||
| Editorial | An unsigned opinion piece that represents the views of the news organization’s editorial staff. | |
| Opinion Piece | An opinion article by a staff columnist or guest columnist. (If a guest columnist, the writer’s credentials will almost always be identified.) | |
| Review | An evaluation of a book, movie, album, live performance, etc. |
News or Opinion? Test Your Understanding
Identify each excerpt that follows as an example of news or opinion—be as specific as you can.
#1 ______________________________________________
“Jeremy Hunt: No Public Interest in Nude Prince Harry Photographs”
Speaking to BBC News this morning, Mr. Hunt said: “Personally I cannot see what the public interest was in publishing those.”
“But we have a free press,” he added, “and I don’t think it is right for politicians to tell newspaper editors what they can and cannot publish. That must be a matter for the newspaper editors.”
He suggested that the public should give the Prince “a break”, days after the daily tabloid published photographs obtained by gossip website TMZ.
Source: “Jeremy Hunt: No Public Interest in Nude Prince Harry Photographs.” The Telegraph, 26 August 2012
#2 _____________________________________________
“Social Media Content Could Make, Break Professional Life”
Do you remember your last tweet? What about last month’s Facebook or Instagram posts? It is all out there somewhere, and employers very well may see something that could hurt their opinion of you.
Tyler Willingham, a senior in marketing and a peer career adviser, was curious to know exactly what an employer’s goal is when perusing a prospective employee’s social media. After speaking with a mentor from a previous internship Willingham held, he found his answer.
“It’s not really an issue of what they look for,” Willingham said “but what they try not to find.”
Career Services interim director Stephanie Kit said some of the things employers hope not to find are pictures and posts involving alcohol or drug usage, negative comments about a current or previous employer and any discriminatory content.
Source: Lipps, Michael. “Social Media Content Could Make, Break Professional Life.” University of Tennessee Daily Beacon, 15 April 2015
#3 _______________________________________________
“‘Kid Nation’ Lesson: Be Careful What You Pitch”
On Friday, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, the union that represents performers but not contestants on reality shows, said it was investigating whether the children on “Kid Nation” should have been covered by the union’s work rules.
With “Kid Nation,” CBS confronted several new situations created by the fact that it was working with children rather than adults.
If “Kid Nation” had been set in California, New York or several other states, it would have been subject to laws that limit the amount of time a child could spend on the set of the program each day. It chose instead to shoot the program in New Mexico, where until this summer there was no law addressing children’s work on television or film productions.
That is not to say that New Mexico had not contemplated such limits. Before CBS took the 40 children to the state, its Legislature had already passed a bill that would have outlawed much of what CBS had planned.
On April 3, two days after CBS started shooting the 13-episode reality series, Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico signed the bill into law. It limits children ages 8 to 15 to eight to nine hours’ work a day on television and film productions.
On the set of “Kid Nation,” the children regularly worked more than 12 hours a day, and their contract required that they be available to the show’s producers to be videotaped 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
But because the new law was not scheduled to go into effect until June 15, roughly one month after “Kid Nation” finished production, lawyers for CBS have contended that everything they did was in compliance with the law “in effect at the time of production.”
But it is not clear whether CBS was in compliance. New Mexico child-labor statutes limit children under the age of 14 to 44 hours of work in one week and eight hours in any day, unless a special permit has been granted. […]
Source: Wyatt, Edward. “‘Kid Nation’ Lesson: Be Careful What You Pitch.” New York Times, 25 August 2007, B7.
#4 ________________________________________________
“Sometimes, the Teachers Bully the Students”
The government of Alberta has re-introduced its Education Act, which addresses the issue of student bullying in schools. The bill affirms that students are entitled to learning environments that are welcoming, caring, respectful and safe.
The government is to be commended both for its process in engaging the community, and for the resulting new provisions.
For example, the bill’s definition of bullying acknowledges that bullying is intentional and repetitive, and that it can cause harm, fear and distress to victims in the school community. Moreover, the bill wisely addresses not just the situation where a student bullies fellow students, but where a student bullies other individuals in the school community. Such recognition that students can bully adults is important because research suggests that students often bully their teachers.
Yet, the bill fails to acknowledge that the imbalance of power between teachers and students creates an opportunity for bullying of students by adults. […] The bill ought to recognize and address the possibility of bullying behavior by adults who work in schools.
Source: Buchfink, Jaclyn, and Juliet Guichon. “Sometimes, the Teachers Bully the Students.” Calgary Herald, 21 February 2012, A13.
Source of exercise: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 by Christine Photinos – National University, San Diego
