Investigative journalism in the academy—possibilities for storytelling across time and space

Abstract

More than thirty universities within the Pacific region are now teaching journalism. Across the sector, there are now hundreds of journalism academics and thousands of students. While students are undergraduates, others are postgraduates who may already have practised as journalists. Considered collectively, this is a large editorial resource which can be partly be deployed in producing journalism in the public interest, including investigative journalism. But while students can play a part, academic journalist involvement is crucial. This article discusses the role that universities can play in building and maintaining investigative journalism in our region. It suggests that global approaches can provide part of the intellectual underpinnings of investigative journalism in universities and explores possibilities for collaborative investigation across time and space and how these might connect to broader innovations in the field of journalism.

Reversing silences in West Papua: Interdisciplinary research and (audio) documentary

“…Journalist-academics Mia Lindgren and Gail Phillips (2015) write that 'while deploying skills familiar in oral history and sociology methodologies, the power of the story and specifically its crafting to maximise its appeal to a future audience is what distinguishes journalism as a discipline' (p. 169). I would argue the practitioners of documentary, investigative and research journalism are more likely to have the capacity to apply indepth methodologies, compared to the vast majority of journalism, increasingly deprived of resources and often pegged to a 24-hour news cycle (Bacon, 2011;Lynch, 2013).…”

“…I took considerable time to edit the English voiceover in an 'echo' form sitting not on top of Kossay's oration, but among it, so that the listener might be made to feel they could understand her original words, spoken in Indonesian. The time given to this endeavour, both in recording and editing (and in research time in terms of long-term ethnographic fieldwork supported by the academy), is not common in most forms of journalism (Bacon, 2011). It is one example of how I believe the affective power of audio documentary can strive to make sure that situated knowledges are not lost in the translation work required in journalism.…”

FRONTLINE: Gentle sounds, distant roar: a watershed year for journalism as research

“…As a process it will probably need to follow rather than precede steps addressing the research profile, and therefore does not need further discussion in this article. There is already and extensive literature on this topic internationally (see Bacon, 1997Bacon, , 2006Bacon, , 2011Robie, 2019;Robie & Marbrook, 2020 for an indication in the Australasian context). Fifthly, there are the profound intellectual and professional consequences of the establishment of the new 45 Indigenous Studies Division, including its three FoR codes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (450109), Māori (450713) and Pacific Peoples (451311) Literature, Journalism and Professional Writing respectively.…”

Research Ethics in Investigative Journalism

“…The benefits of collaborationamong newsrooms locally or transnationally, between universities and newsrooms, among universities with students and experienced journalists working alongsideare well documented (Bacon 2011;Birnbauer 2011;Richards and Josephi 2013;Gearing 2014;Carson and Farhall 2018).…”