"The chapter explores the challenges associated with harassment for entry-level to mid-career journalists across South Africa’s hybrid media platforms. The study employed a qualitative methodology consisting of semi-structured interviews with 12 entry-level and mid-career journalists with industry
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experience ranging from one to six years. Our findings confirm previous studies from the Global South confirming the pervasiveness of sexual harassment in newsrooms. This study established that there is generally an unwillingness of mostly male-dominated management structures in dealing with reports of sexual harassment. Second, we found that journalists, who are sexually harassed by sources and or even by their managers, end up censoring themselves, delivering compromised work and ultimately stunting the democratic project in society. We also found that experiences of female journalists in South Africa specifically, and the Global South more broadly, are not distinct from experiences of harassment in the Global North. We argue that patriarchy seems to be the mainstay in the negative experiences of sexual harassment of women journalists across the globe, which ultimately often renders their voices mute. These findings suggest the need for policies to mitigate the harassment of journalists if their democratic role is to be sustained in South Africa." (Abstract)
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"This book explores how popular cultural artifacts, literary texts, commemorative practices and other forms of remembrances are used to convey, transmit and contest memories of mass atrocities in the Global South. Some of these historical atrocities took place during the Cold war. As such, this book
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unpacks the influence or role of the global powers in conflict in the Global South. Contributors are grappling with a number of issues such as the politics of memorialization, memory conflicts, exhumations, reburials, historical dialogue, peacebuilding and social healing, memory activism, visual representation, transgenerational transmission of memories, and identity politics." (Publisher description)
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"Drawing from case studies from selected African countries, an international team of authors offer a broad insight into the state of harassment across the continent, while building new theoretical perspectives that are also context-specific. The chapters bring previous theories and research up to da
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te by addressing the continual change and development of new discourses, including the use of big data and artificial intelligence in harassing and intimidating journalists and mental health issues affecting journalists in their line of duty. More so, the authors argue that the state and form of harassment is not universal, as location and context are some of the key factors that influence the form and character of harassment." (Publisher description)
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"Responding to mounting calls to decenter and decolonize journalism, The Routledge Companion to Journalism in the Global South examines not only the deep-seated challenges associated with the historical imposition of Western journalism standards on constituencies of the Global South but also the opp
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ortunities presented to journalists and journalism educators if they choose to partake in international collaboration and education.
This collection returns to fundamental questions around the meaning, value, and practices of journalism from alternative methodological, theoretical, and epistemological perspectives. These questions include: What really is journalism? Who gets to, and who is qualified to, define it? What role do ethics play? What are the current trends, challenges, and opportunities for journalism in the Global South? How is news covered, reported, written, and edited in non-Western settings? What can journalism players living and working in industrialized markets learn from their non-Western colleagues and counterparts, and vice versa? Contributors challenge accepted “universal” ethical standards while showing the relevance of customs, traditions, and cultures in defining and shaping local and regional journalism." (Publisher description)
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"This volume presents case studies of news media employing and integrating social media into their news production practices. It links social media use to journalistic practices and news production processes in the digital age of the Global South. Critically, the chapters look at seminal cases of st
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art-up news media whose content is informed by trends in social media, ethical considerations and participatory cultures spurred by the wide use of social media. There has been considerable research looking at the potential of new media technologies, traditional journalism and citizen reporting. The extent to which these new media technologies and 'citizen journalism' have morphed or reconfigured traditional journalism practice remains debatable. Currently, there are questions around the limits of social media in journalism practice as the ethical lines continue to become blurred. It is this conundrum of the role of social media in the reconfiguration of the media, news making, production and participatory cultures that requires more investigation. Social media has also turned the logic of the political economy of media production on its head as citizens can now produce, package and distribute news and information with shoestring budgets and in authoritarian regimes with no license of practice. This new political economy means the power that special interest groups used to enjoy is increasingly slipping from their hands as citizens take back the power to appropriate social media journalism to counter hegemonic narratives. Citizens can also perform journalistic roles of investigating and whistleblowing but with a lack off, or limited, regulation." (Publisher description)
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"This chapter examines the safety risks faced by Zimbabwean journalists as they conduct their day-to-day professional work in online spaces. Given that journalists in Africa are increasingly utilising and adopting social media tools for news production and distribution, it is timely to examine the d
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rawbacks of using these digital technologies. The chapter contributes to the growing scholarship that unpacks how different social actors such as government officials and the public are using digital tools to silence and discipline journalists. It analyses the nature of online harassment and the coping strategies employed by journalists as they navigate the difficult terrain. This study uses the concepts of reciprocal journalism and audience engagement to demonstrate the experiences of Zimbabwean journalists with online harassment. Data is drawn from interviews with 18 participants that include 15 journalists and 3 digital security trainers. Findings demonstrate that online harassment is a huge problem in a politically polarised context such as Zimbabwe. This has undermined the efforts of journalists to engage with audiences in online spaces." (Abstract)
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"Drawing on cases from across the continent, contributors explore the form and nature of social media and government censorship, often via antisocial media laws, or less overt tactics such as state cybersurveillance, spyware attacks on social media activists, or the artful deployment of the rhetoric
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of "fake news" as a smokescreen to muzzle critical voices. The book also reflects on the Chinese influence in African governments’ clampdown on social media and the role of Israeli NSO Group Technologies, as well as the tactics and technologies which activists and users are deploying to resist or circumvent social media censorship." (Publisher description)
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"This edited collection seeks to better understand how journalism across cultures differs, presenting an in-depth exploration of global practices that departs from the typical Western-centric approach. Journalists across the world are trained, generally speaking, within Western models of reporting a
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nd are taught to do so as a practice where reporters need to aspire and aim for. Yet what such training is short of achieving is teaching reporters how to 'do' journalism within their own environments. In turn, what is required is a method of journalistic training and practice that is reflective of the actual practice reporters encounter on the ground. In order to do so, a better understanding of how journalism is practised in different parts of the world, the context surrounding such practices, the issues and challenges associated, and the positive practices that Western journalism can offer, is necessary. Promoting and deploying a culturally-specific and politically-relevant journalism, this book provides just that." (Publisher description)
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"This volume responds to the great need to rethink journalism from various perspectives including journalism training, research, the contents of the news media, language, media ethics, the safety of journalists and gender inequities in the news media." (Publisher description)
"This book explores the role and place of popular, traditional and digital media platforms in the mediatization, representation and performance of various conflicts and peacebuilding interventions in the African context. The role of the media in conflict is often depicted as either 'good' (as symbol
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ized by peace journalism) or 'bad' (as exemplified by war journalism), but this book moves beyond this binary to highlight the 'in-between' role that the media often plays in times of conflict. The volume does not only focus on the relationship between mass media, conflict and peacebuilding processes but it broadens its scope by critically analysing the dynamic and emergent roles of popular and digital media platforms in a continent where the semi-literate and oral communities still rely heavily on popular communication platforms to get news and information. Whilst social media platforms have been hailed for their assumed democratic and digital dividends, this book does not only focus on these positive aspects but also shines a light on dark forms of participation which are fuelling racial, gender, ethnic, political and religious conflicts in highly polarized and stratified societies." (Publisher description)
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"This edited collection argues that the connective and orientation roles ascribed to diasporic media overlook the wider roles they perform in reporting intractable conflicts in the Homeland. Considering the impacts of conflict on migration in the past decades, it is important to understand the capac
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ity of diasporic media to escalate or deescalate conflicts and to serve as a source of information for their audiences in a competitive and fragmented media landscape. Using an interdisciplinary perspective, the chapters examine how the diasporic media projects the constructive and destructive outcomes of conflicts to their particularistic audiences within the global public sphere. The result is a volume that makes an important contribution to scholarship by offering critical engagements and analyzing how the diasporic media communicates information and facilitates dialogue between conflicting parties, while adding to new avenues of empirical case studies and theory development in comprehending the media coverage of conflict." (Publisher description)
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"Since the end of genocide in 1987 Zimbabwe has remained a zone of ‘conflicts’, and the enduring debates surrounding this genocide, especially in public-owned but state-Controlled media, call for critical attention. Three years after independence, in 1980, Zimbabwe was plunged into a genocide na
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med ‘Gukurahundi’ (meaning the rain that washes the chaff away after harvest) that lasted until 1987. This article argues that there has been a clash of ‘interests’ playing out in the mediation of this yet-to-be-officially addressed genocide. Through evidence from public-owned media, the media that carry the official voice of the ruling party, I argue that public media have seen genocide from conflicting and complex angles, making it difficult to reach a consensus suitable for national building based on genocide truths, meanings and effects to Zimbabweans. I specifically use the Unity Accord-associated holiday, the Unity Day, and its associated debates to pursue two arguments. First, public media have played an ambiguous role in appreciating the conflictual and multipronged nature of the genocide within ZANU-PF. Second, public media have largely been supportive of, and even complicit in, official silences on genocide debates and memory. The article uses public sphere and narrative analysis as frameworks for understanding the operations of public media journalism in the mediation of genocide nearly 30 years after its occurrence." (Abstract)
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"This article constitutes an examination on how citizen journalism has challenged Robert Mugabe’s authoritarian regime on issues pertaining to national heroes and usages of the Heroes’ Acre as central national identity markers. Under Mugabe’s ZANU-PF, Zimbabwe has seen the public being limited
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from directly participating in salient national debates. ZANU-PF’s control of the official public sphere has also constrained alternative views from ventilating the government-controlled communicative spaces. The party’s narrative on heroes, the Heroes’ Acre and national identity has gained a taken-for-granted status in the public media. This has obtained against the backdrop of what has become known as the Zimbabwe crisis, characterised by a declining economy, a constricted political space, a breakdown in the rule of law, and the subsequent flight of a number of Zimbabweans into the diaspora. The accompanying wave of technological advancements and the mushrooming of mostly diaspora-based online media have opened up new vistas of communication, enabling a hitherto ‘silenced’ community of ordinary people to participate in national conversations. The conclusion reached here, is that citizen journalism has not only enhanced the culture of conversation among people (as espoused under democratic conditions) but has also covered up the democratic deficit experienced in the public sphere, mediated by traditional media, parliament and pavement radio." (Abstract)
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"This book probes the vitality, potentiality and ability of new communication and technological changes to drive online-based civil action across Africa. In a continent booming with mobile innovation and a plethora of social networking sites, the Internet is considered a powerful platform used by pr
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o-democracy activists to negotiate and sometimes push for reform-based political and social changes in Africa. The book discusses and theorizes digital activism within social and geo-political realms, analysing cases such as the #FeesMustFall and #BringBackOurGirls campaigns in South Africa and Nigeria respectively to question the extent to which they have changed the dynamics of digital activism in sub-Saharan Africa. Comparative case study reflections in eight African countries identify and critique digital concepts questioning what impact they have had on the civil society. Cases also explore the African LGBT community as a social movement while discussing opportunities and challenges faced by online activists fighting for LGBT equality. Finally, gender-based activists using digital tools to gain attention and facilitate social changes are also appraised." (Publisher description)
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"The study uses online observation and critical discourse analysis (CDA) to examine how ‘Ndebeles’ [= Ndebele-speaking people of Zimbabwe] discuss the 1980s genocide and how citizen journalism has generally revolutionised their participation in debates silenced by the ruling elite. What strongly
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comes out from the discussants’ interactions is that the genocide, which has not been addressed since it ‘ended’ with the signing of the Unity Accord in 1987, remains contentious as victims have not found closure. The study concludes that Web 2.0 has reconfigured subaltern communities’ engagements with the traumatic genocide." (Abstract)
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"This collection takes the study of diasporic communication beyond the level of simply praising its existence, to offering critical engagements and analysis with the systems of journalistic production, process and consumption practices as they relate to people who are living outside the borders of t
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heir birth nation." (Publisher description)
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"Through innovative research studies and expert commentaries, this book documents the fast evolving invention of the relationship between the millions of social media and mobile phone users around Africa and traditional purveyors of news. Whilst social media demonstrates an unprecedented ability for
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the politically engaged to both bypass and influence traditional information flows, it also faces unique circumstances through much of Africa. Signs of social change brought by mobile technology are evident around the continent, raising questions about the nature of information exchange and citizenship. Working from a wide variety of perspectives and methodologies, the contributors to this collection address key questions emerging from rapid communication change in Africa. This book reveals how new, participatory, interactive communications technologies are enabling new tellings of Africa’s stories." (Publisher description)
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