Journalism 2020-2021

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This module introduces students to a range of specialisms including music, TV, film and literature reviews. Such journalism is prevalent across print and digital media and is widely read by people of all demographics. It is also a popular career choice for young journalists who enjoy the prospect of writing critical reviews of art, leisure and cultural activities.
 
The module begins by considering the scope of lifestyle journalism, and throughout the lecture programme, students will be introduced to key publications that have reviews of art, culture, food, etc. By deconstructing and discussing relevant articles, students will analyse lifestyle journalism in more detail. For example, week 3 focuses on TV reviews; weeks 4 and 6 look at music, and week 11 is dedicated to book reviews. In some workshops students will be briefed on a new theme and will then have one week to research and write the review. Hence, by the end of the module, they will each have written – and provided photographs for – nine non-assessed articles, which, as a portfolio, cover a wide range of subjects. There are two assessment points, in weeks 7 and 12. Both comprise 800-word articles and three photographs to match the written content.
 
Lifestyle Journalism is a valuable follow-on from Feature Writing (in the first semester) in which students learn a number of skills that can be transferred and further developed in this module. It also complements another Year 2 module: Travel Journalism.

A journalist working in today’s media needs to know how to edit sound and video, how to upload a story to its organisation’s website, even how to summarise a world-changing event in a 140-character tweet. However, important as those skills are, they are not more so than old-fashioned good writing. Journalists need to be able to express themselves clearly and correctly, to have full command of their language and to produce a range of texts in impeccable grammar. They are also required to produce different types of text (from very brief news stories to lengthy investigative reports) using a range of narrative and rhetorical resources. Their stories must be original, surprising, touching, thought-provoking. It does not matter what other resources journalists have (still images, video, graphics, multimedia features), words are, most of the time, still today, the most effective way to tell a great story.

This module aims to develop and refine our students’ writing skills, refresh their knowledge of basic principles of English grammar and prepare them to write increasingly complex texts in other Journalism modules. It will complement modules dedicated to specific journalistic genres and thematic areas. It will also encourage students to develop personal writing styles and acquire the habit of editing and proof-reading their own texts.

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