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Establishing Long-Form Journalism
in the Curriculum
Mitzi Lewis, Midwestern State University John Hanc, New York Institute of Technology Robin Reid, Midwestern State University
“Innovate | Integrate | Engage”
Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication 2016 Conference Minneapolis, MN
Long-Form Journalism and the Conceptual Conundrum August 2016 Panel
Purpose of survey
To better understand how educators are incorporating long-form journalism into their classes
Previous surveys
• how we get students to want to read
• what kind of reading assignments are successful
• courses in which we teach literary journalism
• how we teach new forms of multi-platform literary journalism
• challenges in teaching literary journalism
Survey contributors
Robin ReidMidwestern State Univ.
Mitzi LewisMidwestern State Univ.
John HancNew York Institute of Technology
John CapouyaUniversity of Tampa
Survey respondents N=120 n=86
Organization Affiliation
0
20
40
60
IALJS AEJMC Magazine Division
AEJMC Small Programs
Interest Group
Other
AEJMC Cultural and Critical Studies
AEJMC Entertainment Studies
AEJMC History
AEJMC Minorities and Communication
AEJMC Newspaper & Online News
AEJMC Public Relations
AEJMC Religion and Media
AEJMC Scholastic Journalism
American Conference for Irish Studies
American Journal Experts
American Journalism Historians Association
American Society of Business Press Editors
American Studies Association
Associated Collegiate Press
Association of Christian Collegiate Media
Australian Association of Writing Programs
College Media Advisers
Connectiv (formerly ABM, the B2B business organization)
Cultural Studies Association
Evangelical Press Association
International Communication Association Journalism Studies
National Association of Writers in Education
Online News Association
Society for the History of Authorship
Society of Professional Journalists
Society of Publications in Asia
The Ernie Bushmiller Literary Society. (Founding president. This society never met and disbanded when I graduated from college.)
Twenty countries represented
• Portugal
• Romania
• South Africa
• Spain
• Switzerland
• The Bahamas
• The Netherlands
• United Arab Emirates
• United Kingdom
• United States
• Australia
• Brazil
• Bulgaria
• Canada
• Chile
• Denmark
• Italy
• New Zealand
• Norway
• Poland
Age in years
25-34 4%
35-44 15%
45-54 21% 55-64
44%
65+ 16%
Years teaching
0-4 2%
5-9 13%
10-14 27%
15-19 16%
20 or more 42%
Student level taught
Both 53%
Graduate 7%
Under-graduate
Do you have a professional background in journalism?
No 17%
Yes 83%
In what department do you teach literary journalism?
TOP 8 MENTIONS
Journalism 19 Mass Communication 8
English 6 Communication 3 Creative Writing 3
Journalism and Media Studies 3 Communication and Media Studies 2
Journalism and Communication 2
Do the classes you teach that incorporate literary journalism primarily involve:
The practice of literary journalism
24%
The study of literary journalism
18%
Both 58%
Are the courses you teach (study or practice), wholly devoted to literary journalism or just
partially devoted to literary journalism?
Wholly 30%
Partially 51%
Both 19%
How would you classify the depth to which you cover literary journalism in this course/
those courses? Please select all that apply.
0 10 20 30 40 50
Literary journalism is the focus of the course.
Literary journalism is its own unit among other units in the
course.
Literary journalism is covered as apart of a unit among other
units in this course.
# of responses
Do you assign book-length readings?
Yes, 55%
No, 45%
If you assign book-length readings, do you prefer for your students to read
the paper copy or a digital copy?
Paper copy 39%
Digital copy 4%
I don't have a
preference 57%
0 10 20 30 40
Atavist
Byliner
Longform
Longreads
The Big Roundtable
Vox Magazine
Don't assign web readings
# responses Do you assign readings from any of the following literary journalism resources on the web?
New Yorker Pulitzer list The Atlantic Monthly Medium/Matter New York Times website from original publication Aeon Anfibia (revistaanfibia.com) ASME list Concrete Playground East of the Web Esquire Junkee Lifted Brow
mainly sources in Spanish Narratively New York Review of Books Nieman Narrative Nuevos Chronistas de Indias (nuevoscronistasdeindias.fnpi.org) Periodismo Narrative En Latinoamérica (cronicasperiodisticas.wordpress.com) Polk list Sports Illustrated online archives The Monthly Vanity Fair Walkleys
Other resources
Do you assign readings from any of the following literary journalism resources on the web?
“I encourage students to read widely and discover new websites.”
“magazine articles that won awards at the Canadian Western Magazine Awards and that are part of my curriculum project: themagazineschool.ca”
Do you assign readings from any of the following literary journalism resources on the web?
“As we are a university based in Africa it is important that the majority of our sources and reading materials in courses here are from this continent and not from the US which has a particular type of long form journalism specific to its context. It is important for students here to know their own context, their own continent and to know African authors. I myself read widely from these online sources but choose to use them only sometimes.”
Do you assign readings from any of the following literary journalism resources on the web?
“I send students a link to a feature, especially a long newspaper feature that employs elements of LJ, in advance of a guest writer coming in to talk about her or his work. Usually the focus is on one specific piece of work when a guest does a turn for an hour or 75 minutes. I invite about a half dozen writers per term. Those readings are in addition to the weekly readings I've assigned at the beginning of term.”
If you assign a literary journalism piece that also has a corresponding video (e.g., Truman Capote's In Cold Blood), do you have your students read the book, watch the video, both, or neither?
Read the book 36%
Watch the video
7%
Both 51%
Neither 6%
If you assign a literary journalism piece that also has a corresponding video, do you have your students read the book, watch the video, both, or neither?
“I am using literary journalism as the theme for my first-year writing (composition) course. Students read Hiroshima as well as excerpts from The Art of Fact. However, they also watched Into the Wild, which was adapted from the book by Jon Krakauer. We will also be watching The Insider later in the semester.”
If you assign a literary journalism piece that also has a corresponding video, do you have your students read the book, watch the video, both, or neither?
“I often use videos in class both those associated with literary journalism works and independently to talk about the construction of rhythms, metaphors and symbols—I often find that talking about visual works enables students to translate these elements to writing.”
If you assign a literary journalism piece that also has a corresponding video, do you have your students read the book, watch the video, both, or neither?
“This is bad practice. LitJourn—non-fiction narrative—is so complex, students need every minute of class time to analyze texts, present texts, explicated structure, attempt exercises in elements of narrative, such as the creation of persona. Film/Video/Stills are passive and do not require the labor of learning that text does.”
If you assign a literary journalism piece that also has a corresponding video, do you have your students read the book, watch the video, both, or neither?
“I rarely show video. I did show The End of the Tour last fall because I thought it illuminated the writer-subject relation (and we had just finished reading The Journalist and the Murderer). And I've shown the ‘Just Let Go’ scene from Fight Club as a way to demonstrate my emphasis on breaking away from straight news reporting. But that's about it lately.”
Adaptation Joe Gould's Secret Let Us Now Praise Famous Men Rosa Lee's Story Shattered Glass Silent Spring Spotlight The Art of Fact excerpts The End of the Tour The Insider The Journalist and the Murderer
Blackhawk Down Capote
Dr. Don: The Life of a Small-Town Druggist Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas Fight Club "Just Let Go" scene Frank Sinatra Has a Cold Hiroshima How the Other Half Lives In Cold Blood Into the Wild
Specific books and videos
James Baldwin
Robert Coles
Anne Fadiman
Malcolm Gladwell
Mark Kramer
Adriane Nicole LeBlanc
Susan Orlean
Gay Talese
John Edgar Wideman
Specific authors mentioned independent of their work
Are you incorporating social media into any of your long-form journalism assignments?
Yes 31%
No 69%
A little help from NVivo
• Share cool examples/content and experiences students are having in reporting/immersion
• “Sometimes if I find an interesting topic, by way of the reference of Twitter or other social media, I will refer to it”
• Sourcing stories, sometimes incorporate into narrative • Spur for writing exercises • Metaphor/headline/nut graf practice • A way to show brevity • Short narrative writing • Publishing
• Share content • “Show how stories and community content
influence each other, move in either direction, etc.”
• Class Facebook group • Sourcing stories, sometimes incorporate into
narrative • Metaphor/headline/nut graf practice • Short narrative writing • Publishing
• Sourcing stories, sometimes incorporate into narrative
• Publishing
Other platforms mentioned
• Blog • “to show how stories and community content
influence each other, move in either direction, etc.” • to publish
• LinkedIn—“to show how stories and community content influence each other, move in either direction, etc.”
• Medium—to publish • Vine • WordPress—for class web/blog site • YouTube
Are you incorporating social media into any of your long-form journalism assignments?
“No but I have thought of this and think that it is a really good idea. Great experiments by people like Teju Cole on Twitter doing multimedia "long form" projects through series tweets.”
Do you assign any substantial writing assignments?
Yes 85%
No 15%
If yes, how many pages of writing in total do you require throughout
the entire class/semester?
Range
Lower: 1 page Upper: 240 pages
“If you are willing, please share your most successful reading and/or writing assignments.
If you would like credit, please include your name so the assignment can be properly attributed to you.”
Please see handout for 35 responses
Thank you again to everyone who participated!
Please feel free to share what we learned from you with others so that
they may benefit too.
