Journalism: craft or profession?

Its essay time. And the proactive students are asking questions of the lecturers here (at Sunderland University) that I feel are useful for a wider audience. One particularly pertinent question (to me, to an article in the LRB I only got to read recently) was one of the recurring themes of journalism: is it a craft with skills best learnt in practice on the job, or is it a profession like law or accountancy: requiring formal education?

There’s been quite a bit of debate around this recently. This is one example of a discussion on the topic but Neil Macintosh, Roy Greenslade and Charlie Beckett have also been weighing in on their blogs. But whether or not journalism is a profession rests on whether or not you believe the journalist must be critical and self-aware of the impact of her actions.

Some courses are intensive (ten or twenty weeks) and give you the fundamentals in the craft skills to enter the job market. But the reason why Higher Education is ‘higher’ is that, along with the crafts of the job (news writing, pitching, interview techniques, shorthand) what you also get is an education in critical thinking.

I do believe that you learn the craft skills quicker on the job. And of course you get some media outlets that are responsible. But I feel journalists coming through higher education have the greater opportunity to learn critical thinking skills that they may just not get on the job.

This is one of the best articles I have read for a long while on the reasons why journalists, and critics of journalism, need to be aware of their actions, from the very basic action of the words we choose when writing an article. It is written by a journalist: http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n05/mend01_.html. Read this, and then let me know what you think about the importance of critical awareness of what we do as journalists and its impact on the world.

To practice journalism you need the skills. That means the craft skills of writing and editing, but also the critical skills of awareness and responsibility. You cannot be a responsible practitioner of the journalism craft without an awareness of its role in culture and society. There are plenty of journalists who can write cracking news stories or sharp reviews, but if they have no social responsibility for their actions–what can be read by others and acted upon, or believed–then they are being irresponsible. And so you generally need a profession-oriented approach.

And to make it more confusing, Andrew Marr’s book is called ‘My Trade’ – and I’m not sure if that is a craft or a profession?! What do you think?

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