Helping Journalists Keep the Faith
Photo/Maggie Smith
“Religion is part of the story on science, health, economic, politics, housing, prison, international relations and on and on,” Winston said. “I want to see every reporter capable of handling religion when it crosses their beat. The resources we are developing – surveys, an online course and a handbook – will be targeted to all journalists.”
One project the grant will support is a handbook reviewing scholarship on and coverage of religious traditions and issues at the intersection of religion and society.
“This will cover the evolution of news coverage and religion from the colonial era to the impact of online reporting about religion, the most recent example being how the Saffron Revolution in Burma became an international story,” Winston said.
An e-course, developed in collaboration with the Poynter Institute’s News University, will help reporters overcome religious illiteracy.
Aimed at reporters at all levels and news outlets, the self-directed, online module would provide a primer for journalists who want to know the basics of world religions, theology and American religious history.
“This will be an introduction to world religions – a Religion 101 class,” Winston said. “The course will provide a basic prep on religious story, theology, issues and ideas. Our hope is to see it adopted in newsrooms nationwide.”
The grant also will support two surveys of journalists and news consumers.
The journalist surveys will help explain the decisions journalists make about coverage and to measure that against their knowledge of religion. The surveys will compare print, broadcast, radio and online journalists; bloggers and the “legacy media”; journalists under 30 and over 30; and reporters from distinctive U.S. regions.
The news consumer survey will gauge what readers want as well as what they get along demographic lines and the kinds of media they use.
Winston, who holds the Knight Chair in Media and Religion at the USC Annenberg School for Communication, covered religion for more than a decade at metropolitan papers such as the Baltimore Sun and the Dallas Morning News. She was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize three times before getting her doctorate in religion from Princeton University in 1996.
She is the author of Red Hot and Righteous: The Urban Religion of the Salvation Army and is editor of the forthcoming book Small Screen, Big Picture: Lived Religion and Television.
Winston blogs at http://http://uscmediareligion.org
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USC in the News
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The Chronicle of Higher Education mentioned USC’s $6 billion fundraising campaign. The story noted that USC had already raised $1 billion in a “quiet phase,” including the $200 million naming gift from USC Trustee and alumnus David Dornsife and wife Dana Dornsife to the USC Dornsife College.
The Guardian (U.K.) highlighted two major gifts to USC in a list of the 10 biggest philanthropic benefactors in America. The list included the $200 million naming gift from USC Trustee and alumnus David Dornsife and wife Dana Dornsife to the USC Dornsife College, and the $110 million gift from USC Trustee and USC Viterbi School alumnus John Mork and wife Julie to create the USC Mork Family Scholars Program.
The New York Times featured the USC U.S.-China Institute documentary “Assignment: China — The Week that Changed the World.” The documentary, part of a series, examines media coverage of the 1972 Nixon trip that reshaped U.S.-China relations after a quarter century of isolation and hostility. “People look back now and take it for granted that the outcome was preordained,” said the institute’s Mike Chinoy, who produced the documentary. Voice of America also featured the story.
Los Angeles Times featured the Oscar Senti-meter, a tool developed by the USC Annenberg School, Los Angeles Times and IBM that analyzes thousands of tweets about the Academy Awards nominees. The story noted that Mexican actor Demian Bechir received an enormous boost on Twitter the day of the nominations, with a total of 6,893 tweets mentioning him, a 47-fold increase from the day before. The story noted the tool uses language-recognition technology developed in collaboration with USC Viterbi School’s Signal Analysis and Interpretation Lab.
The Times of India (India) featured a three-day medical emergency training workshop organized in association with USC. At the workshop, held at GCS Medical College in India, 50 doctors and more than 100 paramedics learned how to improve emergency support systems. William Mallon of the Keck School of USC said that discussion topics included the use of portable ultrasonic devices to scan patients. “The ultrasound applications help physicians make accurate and timely decisions,” he noted. Daily News & Analysis (India) also featured the workshop.
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