Telling Factual Stories

Lecture Week 1 - 27/02/2012

"You are the Journalist"

As I stare up at the screen in my very first Journalism Lecture on my very first day of University, I already feel like I have achieved more today than I have the rest of my life prior.

I am the Journalist.

The words entered my retina and danced around the back of my brain for a little while. As far as an introduction lecture goes to get you excited for the next four years, this one held by Dr Bruce Redman at the University of Queensland easily puts any other course to shame.

As I sat eagerly and listened, the question was asked: Why study journalism?

Why was I, Emily Newton of Coffs Harbour, in this room at this university looking at the next 4 years of my life?

As I pondered the great questions that were plaguing my mind at that time, we were told the following reasons.

• Because it is there.
  We use it every day, and as technology advances, news has become readily available to us. It is something that will always be there.
• Because it can tell us about ourselves
  By understanding how journalism works, we ask ourselves, why? This reflects our personal beliefs, it creates a greater understanding and appreciation of ourselves and the world around us.

But I think they forgot to mention one important detail in this introduction lecture...

• Because it changes the world.

Journalists today, while many criticisms exist, whether you like it or not, are a part of what shapes history. While we may not be the politicians of the court house or the winners of gold medals, we are the ones who write and record who we, as human beings, are and what we have done. Without journalists history would have been like past centuries, recorded only by the victors.  It is through Journalists that we record, we learn, we critique, we wonder, we empathise, we sympathise and we get off our ass each day and do something to make a difference. If there were no journalist, then how do we know what is being discovered? How do we know if there is a war going on next door? We don't. 

The world needs journalists, just like a baby needs it's bottle.

As made popular by the 1940s editorial writer for the Washington Post, Alan Barth...

"Journalism is the first rough draft of history"

It's very safe to say, I am more than looking forward to the next 4 years.

- Emmerleener