Monday | 7 October 2024 | Reg No- 06
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Monday | 7 October 2024 | Epaper

In My View

‘Do not write to impress,’ U.S. professor told journalism students

Published : Friday, 17 February, 2023 at 12:00 AM  Count : 855
Syed Badiuzzaman
On the first day of our news writing and editing class at the Graduate School of Journalism of Boston�s Northeastern University in the early 1990s, we all were waiting impatiently with great excitement as that was the most important course of our 40-credit master�s program in journalism on a professional track.   

The class had about 25 American and international students. However, most of the students were from the United States. Some of us including me had already begun our career in journalism in the U.S. or abroad. And Nancy Gallinger, the former shift-in-charge of the Hartford Courant (established in 1764), the oldest continuously published American newspaper and the largest daily in the state of Connecticut, was assigned by the school to teach this course.  

Sharp at 8:00 p.m., Professor Gallinger entered the classroom with a bunch of books in her hand. All of our classes for the graduate program in journalism were held in the evening, enabling working journalists and other people to participate in the program after finishing their daytime regular job. Prof. Gallinger stepped on the low-height dais and briefly introduced herself to the students. Then she asked the students to individually introduce them to that year�s graduate class of news writing and editing at Northeastern University.

After the brief get-to-know session, she stood on the dais facing all students of the class and asked a very fundamental question of the course: �Why do we write news?� Some students promptly said that we write news to inform the public about various incidents. Some students said we write news to tell readers various stories of people. And some other students� answer was pretty straightforward:�We write news because that�s what we are supposed to do as journalists.� Each time a group responded to her question, she nodded her head in approval of what they said.

�But do not write to impress,� Professor Gallinger instructed the class with a strong emphasis. Initially, her suggestion that evening came as a kind of shock and surprise to many students of the class who apparently thought that journalists were supposed to write their stories in a manner that would impress the readers. But Prof. Gallinger hastened to add �just write to communicate.� And then she said: �Your job is not to impress people; your job is to tell them stories in a simple way so that they can clearly understand everything.�

After the well-versed American journalist-turned-professor corrected the ideas of many of us about news writing, the whole class was impressed on the first day by her thorough knowledge and clear understanding about journalism. �Remember, you are not writing for scholarly journals. You are writing for the mass media which will be read by common people with average education or no education at all. Therefore, always write in simple language using common words so that your writing will be easily understood by everybody,� Prof. Gallinger told the class.

In every journalism class of our master�s program at Northeastern University, the students were highly encouraged to participate in the discussion anytime even by interrupting the lecture of a professor. However, the whole class was in complete agreement that evening with Professor Gallinger because everything she said about news writing made perfect sense. �Just a little earlier, you all said you write for the people,� she told us adding: �But if people do not understand what you write then your writing is nothing but some useless texts that only fill the empty space of a newspaper.�  

In Bangladesh, attempts are made to write daily news for various media more or less in a simple way. However, some stories are sometimes presented in a clumsy or complicated manner with inappropriate and uncommon words in both print and digital versions of some media outlets of the country. They often lack clarity and thus are not easily understood by common readers. Many journalists write their stories in mostly long sentences. And many stories routinely miss necessary and important background information. So, when new readers read a follow-up story on something, they do not get the full picture.        

Apart from hard news, many Bangladeshi newspapers regularly publish articles and other materials with no clear meaning. Not only the writers of these articles but also the editors who approve them for publication bear responsibility for not following the basic rule of writing simply with simple words for the mass media. And thus they deprive the common readers of a chance to read and understand these articles easily. Many writers and journalists do not know how to write in a simple way using common and simple words. And some writers and journalists rather take pride in writing complex sentences with uncommon words.

When I was in Bangladesh several years ago, one day I was sitting with the joint editor of a daily English-language national newspaper at his office in Dhaka. He was also in charge of the editorial and op-ed pages of that daily. As we had our coffee, I started reading an article published on that day in his newspaper which was written by a college professor. The first paragraph of that article didn�t make any sense to me. Then I read the second paragraph which also appeared totally meaningless. After that I read the third paragraph but honestly I had the same experience. So, I asked the joint editor if he had read this article before publishing it. The joint editor just smiled and never uttered a single word.   

As I left his office that day, I thought that this kind of thing could happen only in the case of a so-called Bangladeshi leading newspaper. It would never happen in any prominent national newspaper of any other South Asian country -- let alone India and Pakistan. Articles with no clear thoughts, opinions or messages or written in an ambiguous way with complicated sentences and unheard of words call into question the qualifications and experience of not only their writers but also the editors who approve them for publication. There is no doubt that such articles or opinion pieces hurt the reputation of not only the concerned editors but also the newspapers publishing them.

According to a guidebook for newspapers published by the American Press Institute (API), �clarity, style and accuracy� are the three keys to what it calls �the magic kingdom of writing.�  A writer�s job is to make things clear to the reader and they should do it by writing simply with simple words. Jules Edward Loh, an Associated Press writer once said: �A simple declarative sentence is like a beautiful woman in a plain, black dress.� And echoing his point of view, Arthur Brisbane, an old-time American editor added: �See a thing clearly and describe it simply. That is the essence of good newspaper work.�  

Many American journalism experts have concluded that a writer is nothing without readers.  A reader reads a story with high expectations; if the writer betrays those expectations, he or she destroys the reader�s trust. And as noted by Kenn Finkel, former news editor of Dallas Times Herald: �The editor is the conscience of the writer and the newspaper. He challenges facts and writing, and upholds the newspaper�s standards.�

-    The writer is a Toronto-based journalist who also writes for the Toronto Sun as a guest columnist  



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