GJIL researchers Candis Callison and Mary-Lynn Young’s new book, Reckoning: Journalism’s Limits and Possibilities, has been published by Oxford University Press.
This book challenges conventional beliefs about media objectivity. Through this book, the authors point out that journalism has done a great deal of harm through the decades by reinforcing colonialism and gendered structures. They also highlight research demonstrating the under-representation of minority journalists and the pervasiveness of “white masculinity” in North American newsrooms.
In an article for the the Toronto Star, they wrote:
“Instead of business as usual, journalists need to set aside their long love affair with objectivity and learn to locate themselves in terms of their social histories, relations, and obligations. Journalists need to recognize that what they think happened is deeply related to who they are and where they’re coming from in broad and specific senses. Journalists need to employ what we term systems journalism that covers events and issues not as one-offs, but as intersections of societal systems and structures that have histories. And this means investigating histories many weren’t taught and don’t know.”
Young is a professor at School of Journalism, Writing and Media Studies. Callison is an associate professor at the School of Journalism, Writing and Media Studies and the Institute for Critical Indigenous Studies at UBC.