100-205 Writing Journalism

This subject is only available to students enrolled in the BA (Media and Communications), BA (Media and Communications)/Bachelor of Commerce, and BA (Media and Communications)/Bachelor of Laws.

Completion of 25 points of core Media and Communications subjects and 25 points of optional Media and Communications subjects at first year level.

This subject teaches the craft of writing news stories and features for print and electronic media. Students learn what news is, how news stories are written, how concise and clear language is vital to effective communication, how news stories are gathered, how they are presented, and how different journalists might deal with the same story. Feature and critical writing are explored, including specialised forms of journalistic writing such as travel, obituaries, columns and reviews. The course teaches students some of the principles of writing for public relations and for in-house journals, and deals with the symbiotic relationship between PR practitioners and the news media. Principles of good interviewing are also covered in this course. A portion of the subject is devoted to broadcast journalism, including instruction in the art of writing for radio and TV, incorporation of interviews, writing to pictures and production of news bulletins. Other areas of instruction include editing, ethics and fairness and excellence in writing. On completion of this subject, students should have developed a strong grasp of journalistic practices, ethics and skills.

• demonstrate competence in writing for the media, including optimum communication techniques and methodology;

• understand the imperatives of contemporary journalism;

• be able to make editorial assessments of how effectively a story has communicated facts and concepts.

Two news stories of 300-400 words each, 30% (First one due 23rd March, second one due 11th April), a short feature story of 800-1000 words 20% (due 4th May), a long feature story of 1500 - 1700 words 30% (due 25th May), report of 500 words 10% (due 1st June) and class participation including tutorial exercises and quizzes 10%. Students must attend at least 80% of classes to be eligible for assessment.

A subject reader will be available from the Bookroom at the beginning of semester.