PRACTICE REVIEW: JOURNALISM ETHICS AND CONFESSIONAL JOURNALISM

Confessional journalism has become a staple of contemporary journalism, either in the form of first-person real-life experiences (often ghosted by journalists) or regular columns by journalists detailing intimate details of their lives. The form is now recognised as a distinct genre but what has not received attention, except as an internal debate within journalism itself, are the consequences of this form of writing for journalism and journalists. There is mounting evidence that editors are exerting pressure towards this form of writing, favouring particular types of writers. This review investigates the compelling ethical implications for writers and their subjects within the genre and argues that these implications are producing distinctive journalistic responses and strategies.     

Travel Journalists and Professional Identity

Online resources are increasingly facilitating research for those traveling for business or leisure. Professionally produced articles and guides are now consulted alongside TripAdvisor, blogs, wikis, and other non-professional sources. This research seeks to understand the role of travel journalists, to explore their occupational ideology and how they distinguish themselves from other content creators. Through content analysis and interviews with English-speaking journalist and bloggers who focus on Paris as a destination, researchers were able to identify an ideology specific to professional travel journalists. Ultimately they do not do anything that amateur writers cannot, and often rely on their branded publication to give them credibility. Travel journalists do, however, adopt some practices inherent to bloggers interviewed, including moving towards more personal writing and lowering reporting standards, while resisting social media. While in a moment of identity crises, travel journalists still differentiate themselves from bloggers, further research will reveal if this phenomenon is unique to a highly mediatized destination like Paris.     

The true costs of scholarly journal publishing

There has been much debate recently about whether publishers' prices are too high, and what publishing a journal article really costs. Publication of the article in a journal is only one part of the cost of research communication; first of all there are the costs of research and writing, then the costs of peer review, editing and publication, and finally the costs of acquisition by the library, management, storage, reading by the end user and long‐term preservation. Several studies have been conducted of these different costs; the results are summarized and the potential impact, both on costs and on sources of funds, of moving to an alternative, ‘author‐funded’ open access model is considered.     

Democracy or Republic: Answering a Frequent Reference Question

This article frames the issues that the writers of the U.S. Constitution left as one of their writing legacies. The writers settled on the idea of founding a republic rather than a monarchy or democracy because they believed it the most stable form of government available to them. Their debate over “republic or democracy” found its way quickly into political discourse, with theoreticians like Will Butts and Eugene Volokh offering different views about which terms worked best to describe some of the political disagreements of modern times. This essay is best read in association with the short article on civic education by Reneé Critcher Lyons, which follows this article.     

图书馆学论文写作现象探析

目前学术界主要是从学术研究的角度来讨论图书馆学学术论文的写作问题,文章则从客观存在的图书馆学学术论文的现实状态入手,总结出图书馆学学术论文写作现象的几个特点,然后进一步探究现象背后更为深层的问题。文章认为,目前国内图书馆学学术论文写作现象主要有以下几个特点:1、论文数量较多,质量高的较少;2、大多数人研究范围较宽泛,形成稳定研究方向的少;3、重视论文学术性、严谨性、创新性,轻视论文生动性,较少使用修辞用句;4、发表个人观点占绝大多数,进行商榷、争鸣或学术批评的较少;5、有一些图书情报期刊编辑撰文探讨如何写作专业论文,图书馆学家讲述专业学术论文写作的太少。形成这种状况的原因主要和图书馆人的学历、专业结构有关。作为研究者应不断提高自己的学历、完善其知识结构,提高研究水平;作为图书馆界,则应进一步加强对人员培训的力度。     

USING CITIZENS FOR COMMUNITY JOURNALISM

Hyperlocal journalism is thriving. This article describes the case of a Belgian regional newspaper experimenting with citizen journalism and user-generated content (UGC) for hyperlocal news coverage. For each municipality of the region, an online news page has been created where all citizen contributions are published side by side with professional stories on local community news and events. The fact that the UGC is not separated from the professional articles makes it an interesting case to examine commonalities and differences between both types of community reporting. The findings, based on a content analysis of 474 news items, suggest that the newspaper seems to use citizen volunteers primarily as a means to outsource the “soft”, “good” and “small” news coverage of local community life, while preserving the “hard” and “bad” news provision as the exclusive domain of professional journalists. Further, the study's findings support previous research indicating that (1) local community journalism is characterised by a mix of crime reporting and news coverage of fires and accidents, on the one hand, and positive human-interest stories about social club activities, cultural events, health and sports, and school life, on the other; and that (2) citizen journalists tend to rely heavily on first-hand witnessing and personal experience due to a general lack of access to official sources of information.     

Using a Blended Group Learning Approach to Increase Librarians’ Motivation and Skills to Publish

While there is considerable research on interventions to support academic staff in writing for publication, there is limited literature on writing interventions for librarians. This article explores the potential of a blended learning approach to support librarians to develop the motivation and skills to write for publication. The program combines three elements: a formal writing seminar; a structured series of online exercises and mentoring support; and two peer-feedback days. The article suggests that the combination of online and face-to-face activities has the potential to be a sustainable model for helping to develop librarians as academic writers. It suggests that this type of model could provide a context, which is currently lacking, for librarians to develop their identity and skills as academic writers.     

PERIODICALS,THE BOOK TRADE AND THE ‘BOURGEOIS PUBLIC SPHERE’

Despite recent assertions about the new prospects opened up by the literary periodicals which emerged in the years immediately following the expiry in 1695 of the Licensing of Print Act, it is apparent that, right through to the 1740s, writing for the stage remained the best prospect for a writer hoping to make a living by the pen. We should therefore be cautious before we make sweeping generalizations either about the profits to be made out of periodical publication or the expanding opportunities they presented for professional writers, let alone about the role of the periodical essays of Addison and Steele in the emergence of ‘a bourgeois public sphere’ in which hierarchy was suspended, and which was accessible to all. Despite The Spectator's advocacy of polite rational exchange, historical consideration of the periodical press at this time reveals a high degree of political partisanship.     

美国图书馆社会责任之争的缘起、发展及其职业遗产

20世纪60年代末,美国图书馆界开始了一场以图书馆职业是否应当参与解决战争、种族或性别歧视、环境污染等社会问题的激烈争论,争论围绕承担社会责任是否偏离职业使命、是否颠覆职业客观中立立场、是否违背信息自由原则等方面展开。这场争论引导图书馆职业重新思考职业的传统价值观,它与社会责任圆桌会议开展的活动一起为世界图书馆职业积累了宝贵的职业遗产。     

Writing medical papers: a practitioner’s view

Considers the numbers of specialist medical papers published; checks on their accuracy; motives for writing and for selection for publication; and suggests guidelines for writers of papers.     

Violence in television news: A case study of audience response

On February 2, 1968, about 20,000,000 Americans watched South Vietnam's Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan shoot a suspected Viet Cong in the head on a Saigon street. Color film of that execution was shown on NBC's Huntley‐Brinkley Report. There was also a black and white still photograph by Eddie Adams of Associated Press. The impact of that single news story on public opinion about the war will be argued for some time. In an attempt to analyze the audience reaction to the NBC film report, a content analysis of audience mail to NBC was performed. Further, questionnaires were sent to the letter‐writers for additional information and to further explore their reasons for writing.     

Allocation formulas in the literature: A review

Librarians have been writing about the allocation of resources for most of the twentieth century. For about 60 years, many of the writings have focused on devising formulas to assist with the allocation problem. While many individual formulas have been offered in the past, differences among them are frequently subtle and constitute variations on a theme. The present paper examines the existing literature that centers on formulation and ties together the concerns that have been expressed by writers in the past several decades.     

The Feeling of ‘Silverland’

This is a discussion of the group of journalists working in and around Virginia City during the 1860s and 1870s, when the area became the world centre of the silver mining industry. The so-called Sagebrush writers reported on mining prospects for readerships locally and internationally, as well as writing anecdotes and stories about the life of the highly transient local communities generated by the search for silver. Theirs is writing characterised both by caution in responding to the mining industry and by an aggressive humour in depicting the local life of a cosmopolitan instant city. These newspaper writers have been considered in the local context of the Nevadan frontier. Here, I discuss their engagement with a complex and internationally networked industry, and also their address to the collectivities of the local population.     

基于文献调研的国内外研究生信息素养教育实践进展

[目的/意义]运用文献调研方法,对2000年以来国内外研究生信息素养教学实践研究论文进行归纳梳理,探讨教学模式及教学内容变化新趋势,为国内同行开展研究生信息素养教育提供参考。[方法/过程]分别以Web of Science平台的SCI-E及SSCI数据库和中国知网的中国学术期刊网络出版总库为研究对象,收集国内外自2000年以来发表的有关研究生信息素养教育的期刊论文,通过分析研究生信息素养教学模式与教学内容,总结新环境下研究生信息素养教育的主要研究成果。[结果/结论]近年来嵌入式信息素养教育得到进一步应用与推广,基于学习项目或研究任务的信息素养教育、基于同伴培训的信息素养教育及"翻转课堂"的应用具有借鉴意义,而文献综述与写作技能、科技查新、数据素养等可以作为信息素养教育的拓展。研究生信息素养教育应以课程教学为主,开展更广泛的合作,尤其是引入写作、出版方面的专家;重视与专业课程结合,培养专业技能及信息能力;仍要重视研究生检索技能的培养并需要系统的信息素养评价工具或评价体系来测试研究生信息素养能力及评估信息素养教育效果。     

AMERICAN SPORTS WRITERS’ SOCIAL MEDIA USE AND ITS INFLUENCE ON PROFESSIONALISM

American sports writers' use of social media as a newsgathering tool has influenced journalism practice, further complicating the industry's abstract definition of “professionalism.” This study builds on a pilot study published in the fall 2011 issue of Journal of Sports Media, which assessed print sports journalists' use of social media. In the current study, a survey was administered to 77 full-time print sports journalists who cover professional sports. This paper seeks to extend the pilot study and previous professional research in two ways: firstly, to assess how this specific subgroup of sports writers use Facebook and Twitter to gather information; and secondly, to analyze how these sports writers define “professionalism” and what industry factors correlate with chosen definitions, such as newspaper circulation and work superiors' attitudes toward social media. Cross-tabulations and chi-square tests were used to test hypotheses. Cramer's V or Phi, depending upon the cross-tabulation, were used to measure relationship strength. Results suggest this subset of sports writers more often uses Twitter for newsgathering purposing than Facebook. There is also a strong relationship between the frequency of Twitter usage and the definition of professionalism chosen; circulation size and instances of directly quoting from athletes' social media accounts; and age and Twitter usage.     

Thomas Mann's Contributions to Current Library Debates on Cataloging and Bibliographic Control

This article examines the writing of Thomas Mann, Reference Librarian at the Library of Congress, regarding the enduring value of traditional methods and tools of research libraries, particularly online public catalogs, professional cataloging, and Library of Congress Subject Headings and pre-coordinated subject strings. One major contention asserted by Mann is that keyword searching on the Internet, while very valuable when used judiciously, should not be used as a substitute for traditional catalogs and cataloging. Also examined are the deprofessionalization of cataloging, inadequate ideas about library users, dangers to serious research, digitization, and the enduring value of books.     

The plagiarism project

Plagiarism has been a problem plaguing academia for centuries. The Internet has made it easier than ever to copy material from one electronic document and paste it into another. Many cases are unintentional, as writers are unaware of the rules regarding plagiarism. This paper provides an overview of plagiarism and describes a project in which librarians partnered with the assistant dean of a graduate science program to educate students about the perils of plagiarism and encourage ethical writing practices.     

The Plagiarism Project

Plagiarism has been a problem plaguing academia for centuries. The Internet has made it easier than ever to copy material from one electronic document and paste it into another. Many cases are unintentional, as writers are unaware of the rules regarding plagiarism. This paper provides an overview of plagiarism and describes a project in which librarians partnered with the assistant dean of a graduate science program to educate students about the perils of plagiarism and encourage ethical writing practices.