This book is a practical guide to all aspects of modern journalism for anyone seeking to study for the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) Diploma in Journalism and become a qualified journalist in the UK.
Written in collaboration with the NCTJ, Essential Journalism outlines everything you need to know about the journalism industry today, from its ethical framework to its practice across print, television, radio, online and social media. It looks at the core principles and the skills that are required of journalists across all platforms, helping students develop an overall understanding of the business and examining the application and adaptation of traditional best practice to the demands of the digital age. This is a unique one-stop shop for anyone who wants to understand the nature and purpose of journalism, and how it is changing and evolving in today's digital newsrooms.
This book is a core resource for journalism trainees and undergraduates, as well as for seasoned practitioners and lecturers.
FOREWORD
By Alex Crawford, Patron of the National Council for the Training of Journalists.
PREFACE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
PART ONE: JOURNALISM AND JOURNALISTS
1 The journalism landscape
2 The nature of journalism: The nature of news
3: You, the reporter
4 Ethics
5 Regulation
PART TWO: STORYFINDING AND STORYTELLING
6 Storyfinding: The general reporter
7 Storyfinding: Sources
8 Storyfinding: Interviewing
9 Storytelling: Anatomy of a news story
10 Storytelling: Writing a news story
11 Storytelling: Language and style
12 Storytelling: Reporting numbers and statistics
PART THREE: MULTI-PLATFORM JOURNALISM
13 The digital journalist: the digital scene and writing for the website
14 The digital journalist: social media and online research
15 The radio journalist: the radio scene and writing for radio
16 The radio journalist: news summaries and radio reporting
17 The television journalist: the television scene and picture gathering
18 The television journalist: continuous news and television reporting
19 The print journalist
20 The mobile journalist: The freelance journalist
PART FOUR: SPECIALIST PRACTICE
21 The feature writer
22 The court reporter
23 The political reporter
24 The specialist reporter
This book summarised in two pages
Further reading
Index