Media Studies

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What is the media? The question is directed at Columbia School of Journalism in New York, where I was told the media is subjective. Such schools teach the same thing all over the world.

If I could be a speck of dust in a college lecture hall, I would listen to what retired journalists teach students, about the craft of news gathering and dissemination. No. I don’t think Journalism modules include Twitter. Students have that in their phones.

What is the media? Reporters who work for established media houses want an answer because they are maligned, wrongly accused of every photographic, digital and printed misdemeanour.

They correctly point out that tools of the trade such as microphones, cameras and  typewriters are no longer exclusively theirs. The cellphone is the current DW, CBC, BBC, SABC, DW, Agence France Presse or Al Jazeera.

What is the media? Is a blog a packet of news? Is a podcast news? To their followers, FB, Instagram, YouTube and other social media platforms are pregnant with news. We won’t discuss Twitter. It’s a league of its own.

That is why the term ‘media’ is a dinosaur and must be replaced by simply, online sources.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.

 

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