Annotated Bibliography

 Below demonstrates a popular news story, the Italian custody battle for the four daughters, as reported via three different medians; Radio Podcast, Online Article and a Television News show.  Following this, is an article produced on reporting social drama and the limitations of such within Journalism and Communication.

Colvin, M. (Producer), & Guest, A. (Presenter).

(2012, May 16). Court rules four children should return to Italy

[Audio podcast]. Retrieved from http://www.abc.net.au/pm

This radio podcast reported by Annie Guest delivers a very emotive audio story of four Italian daughters whom were brought over to Australia by their mother, away from their Italian father whom, as stated multiple times within the podcast, was allegedly abusive. PM is a four-decade old institution, which is has been a credible part of public broadcasting for much of the producer, Mark Colvin’s life. Whilst the source may be credible, it engages it’s listeners though the constant use of loaded words such as ‘desperate attempt’, ‘abusive father’, ‘the mother bowed to fight on’ to encourage the audience to listen and think about the matter at hand. This proves to be the benefit of a radio podcast. The ability to include the person-in-question’s side of the story, to literally hear the voice of the person whom the story is about, to hear the pain, struggle and worry in the mother’s voice allows the audience to form an opinion about the case. It is clear with each version of the story being produced, that each median and station is desperately trying to find exclusivity to offer their audience to make it more appealing. However, this source is limited due to the fact that it solely relies on the mother’s side of the story, and fails to give viewpoint of the daughters or the father.  Despite the limitations, it does offer a range of details and is clear, well researched and corroborates a lot of the facts found within the other versions. This median is quick, cheap and allows a story to be immediately brought to it’s listeners and regularly updated as opposed to a newspaper to which has to be bought, read and then by that time, the story may already be out-of-date.

Fife-Yeomans, J. (2012, May 17). How an Italian fairytale became a tug-of-love nightmare. The Telegraph. Retrieved from  http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au

Janet Fife-Yeomans, the author of this article, brings with her much experience as a bestselling author and award-winning journalist who has worked in newspapers and television in Australia and England. She takes on a personal angle, one that the audience will be able to familiarize with, one of a real-life fairy-tale, but with a twist of mystery. The scope of this story proves to have a lot more depth than the other medians as it demonstrates that a lot more research has been used. It has everything needed for a newsworthy story, locality, mystery, violence, love gone wrong, possible abduction and is full of emotion. It is clear that this story is well researched as it goes into great detail about the father, including his mental history and reports from the daughter’s psychologist whom interviewed the girls and reported that the mother’s claim about the father being abusive, lacked physical or emotional evidence, thus add exclusivity as most other versions of the story position the audience to sympathise with the mother. This source has varied in that it offers an objective piece, it offers facts and a realistic account of the story, which makes it more reliable as it is not trying to argue a point. It includes quotes from relevant sources such as the judge, Justice Colin Forrest, which further confirms what is detailed in the story, and makes the story more credible. Compared to the other medians, online journalism has a lot more freedom, however it is clear when visiting the website that it is not just dedicated to delivering the news. Unlike the podcast, this is a platform for commercials and relies heavily on its audience for profit. The website has advertisements, classifieds, entertainment and other aspects to further draw in it’s audience. It is clear that this was an entertainment piece through the choice of fairy-tale theme to draw in consumers. 

Hansen, D. (Writer). (2012, May 16). Sisters in Battle. Today Tonight [Television Broadcast]. Sunshine Coast, Australia. Retrieved from http://au.news.yahoo.com/today-tonight/video/

The median of televising this story on the local news show Today Tonight proved to be very impersonal. Broadcasted on a free-to-air television channel, this commercially based platform is largely dictated by delivering what would draw in the audience. Whilst providing a brief overview of the four girl’s story, the highlight is that they are currently ‘fugitives’ being held hidden by their great grandmother, adding a sense of mystery and curiosity to the story. To make up for it’s lack of new details as provided by other sources of the story, the report’s exclusivity is based on the inclusion of a first-time-ever phone interview with the great grandmother whom was ‘the only one’ who knew the whereabouts of the girls.  It is blatant that the phone interview was full of prompted questions asked only because the answers were already clear. Thus the point of such was to corroborate what they were reporting, it wasn’t to hear the great grandmother’s story but rather to give the audience confirmation and to add credibility to the story. The major difference of this median and style of reporting the story was that it strongly encouraged and positioned the audience to think and form an opinion about the story. The reporter concludes by encouraging the audience to that take that opinion and to post it on their website, to create controversy and to create for the audience a feeling that they are apart of the case, and that their opinion matters, and furthering their exposure to advertisements. Television has many advantages to reporting a story, as it includes audio, images, video and has the ability to report the story as it is happening. It offers its audience    

Briziarelli, M., B. Klocke & M. McDevitt. (2012). Social drama in the academic-media nexus: Journalism's strategic response to deviant ideas. Journalism, 13 (3): 1-16.  DOI: 10.1177/1464884912443191

The three authors of this journal article, an associate Professor in Journalism and Mass Communication, a communication doctoral candidate in Journalism and Mass Communication and an Assistant Professor of Sociology, all bring years of experience and an extensive range of knowledge to the piece. This insightful source discusses the importance and elaborates on journalism when writing about social-drama. Through exemplifying through the case by Ward Churchill’s journalism piece on the dramatic event of 9/11, the authors demonstrated how dangerous and temperamental writing about such events could be. When one is searching for different angles on how to report the story, it is explicit that a journalist is often limited by the social norms, and once one breaches or offends this, as Churchill had done, a journalist may be reassessed as his loyalty and motives are questioned and his whole persona could be considered a danger to the minds of the audience. The article is formal, and draws upon many useful sources such as the anthropology by Victor Turner and a multiplicity of textbook and scholarly sources, thus adding much credibility and corroboration to this article.