I agree that the media coverage has been orientalist in nature--in particular, the media seems to shift between a sort of condescending praise of "the wisdom of the Japanese" and a general mistrust / criticism of the Japanese and their government (insinuating that the Japanese are naive for not being more alarmed by the nuclear plant issue, that the foreign media has a much better grasp of the situation than the Japanese media, and that the Japanese government and TEPCO cannot be trusted). <br>
<br>--Lindsay<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Sat, Mar 19, 2011 at 7:37 AM, Dolores Martinez <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:dm6@soas.ac.uk">dm6@soas.ac.uk</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-left: 1ex;">
Interesting comments, Roger.<br>Some things I would add: that few of the star reporters speak Japanese (few may be too kind, perhaps none would be best). This was most noticeable with the Guardian, who recalled (my old student) Jonathan Watts from Beijing to do the human interest stories because he has incredibly good Japanese (and is literate as well).<br>
A colleague was interviewed by BBC radio last weekend and asked if the Japanese were genetically adapted to surviving earthquakes. And I did a pre-interview with Newsnight in which I refused to say that the Japanese were somehow very different from the rest of us in how they were dealing with the crisis. We mutually agreed that I would not appear...<br>
Except for Watts' stuff, it has all been very Orientalist I think and very upsetting that a human tragedy and crisis has been reduced to 'how odd these Japanese are.'<br>Lola<div><div></div><div class="h5"><br>
<br><div class="gmail_quote">On 19 March 2011 12:45, Roger Macy <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:macyroger@yahoo.co.uk" target="_blank">macyroger@yahoo.co.uk</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-left: 1ex;">
<div bgcolor="#ffffff">
<div><font face="Arial">
<h1 style="margin: 0cm 0cm 6pt;"><u><font size="5">Media coverage of the quake and
tsunami in Japan</font></u></h1>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">Dear KineJapaners,</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"><span>I was also glad to have the silence on this
list broken and to hear from friends.<span>
</span>I sincerely hope that those I have not yet heard from are safe and do not
have friends or relatives afflicted by these tragedies.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">There have been direct and
indirect references to media coverage of the disaster on the threads
‘Fundraising Screening of CALF …’ and ‘the eerie silence on KineJapan …’ [which
we have well-and-truly broken!].<span>
</span>But I would like to hear of members’ takes on the coverage when they are
ready.<span> </span>My own contribution is a
little long, so feel free to file or delete.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">When I turned on this Saturday
morning, here in the UK, <span> </span>just
before 8am (in fact, to set my radio timer), there was a studio interview
started, on BBC News 24, in a ‘Newswatch’ slot, of Kevin Blackhurst., who I see
is Controller of the channel.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">I should straightway give some
credit that the interview took place, even though, to me, Blackhurst this week
has seemed like pornographer-in-chief.<span>
</span>The interviewer (didn’t get a name) was relaying viewers’ complaints that
the BBC and other channels had unnecessarily despatched and fronted star
reporters, when some pooling with other channels, namely ITN news, would have
been more appropriate, and that the reporting had been too excitable.<span> </span>Blackhurst posited that his people were
reporting, not presenting, a proposition with which I absolutely disagree.<span> </span>He also answered in a way that the
‘that’ he purported to be answering was the presentation of the nuclear
situation, not the actual disaster that has actually already happened.<span> </span>To my mind, that was a full admission of
guilt.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">The other topic of viewers’ – no,
the audience’s – complaints that I heard was not being able to hear the
headlines over the jingles. In this brief discussion<span> </span>‘hear’ and ‘understand’ were used
interchangeably – an equivalence that is fundamentally misconceived for
reporting from a non-english-speaking country.<span> </span>This, to me, was the subject that should
have been discussed and wasn’t.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">The jingles for 8am then came on
– somewhat muted, I thought - and the Libyan situation was covered.<span> </span>When we got to Japan, a named reporter was interviewed with a
Tokyo backdrop and presented <u>only</u> the
situation concerning the nuclear plants at Fukushima.<span> </span>We were told that the Fukushima fifty were
getting massive amounts of radiation. “Massive” was a naked epithet, given fully
pornographic emphasis. [ I have read, <u>read</u> in the Guardian, I think, that
that the team had been both considerably reinforced and rotated – any
clarification gratefully received.] He did say that radiation in Tokyo was negligible but that was it – nothing else in
Japan was newsworthy – onto the next
story, this one’s dying.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">To my mind, it’s the editing
that’s at fault.<span> </span>The stars perform
as directed.<span> </span>Nothing gets
corrected.<span> </span>The nearest to a
correction is that ‘large/massive earthquake in Tokyo’ on Radio4 gets superseded by maps.<span> </span>But we were told, for example, that
several trains were missing, including a shinkansen with 400 people and we get
shown pictures of mangled local trains.<span>
</span>I’m told that the Japanese media have reported that all trains were
evacuated, but desensationalizing isn’t newsworthy.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">I had sworn, after the
Twin-towers attack, and its toll of time and depression, never again to inflict
upon myself those weeks of woefully edited news.<span> </span>It should not, in 2001, have taken weeks
for the purported death toll to come down below 100,000 and for us to understand
that just about everyone below the impacts had got out.<span> </span>Numbers, thankfully, seem to one thing
our transported stars seem to be able to pick up, so the casualties, although of
an appalling magnitude, are already being reported more responsibly than in
2001. [But they have to be served up in western numerals for them; ‘daiichi’ is
conveyed as a place name.]<span> </span>Alas,
that responsibility seems to be confined to that one ‘island’ where they are
following the Japanese media.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">The complaint I hear here is of
the sheer imposition and insensitivity of imposing our stars upon the
hospitality of desperate people in need - and there are, after all, hundreds of
national audiences to be entertained by different teams.<span> </span>I accept that conveying the tragedy and
getting a sense that <u>some</u> survived is important news reporting and is
best done by interview.<span> </span>But if the
interviewees need to be translated, what is gained by having an english-speaking
interviewer? – given that so much understanding and initiative has to be lost in
the process?<span> </span>More importantly, in
terms of ethnic prejudice, why is a victim report only true if mediated through
an english-speaking star?</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">Lack of language skills in the
newsroom is deplorable but actually surmountable in this media age, with a
little humility.<span> </span>Since many clips
are endlessly repeated in ‘breaking news’, a posting on-line would rapidly
elicit a translation (which should, for safety’s sake, be attributed).<span> </span>If newsrooms want to<span> </span>prefer voice-overs to subtitles they
will doubtless pursue that.<span> </span>Even
without necessity, there is some acceptance of small-screen subtitles
(<a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2011/mar/04/the-killing-bbc-danish-crime-thriller/print" target="_blank">http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2011/mar/04/the-killing-bbc-danish-crime-thriller/print</a>)
but, in any case, there is no excuse for ducking both formats and bluffing it
out without star-led descriptions of pictures already seen.<span> </span>By that stage, we have descended to
something that should fairly be called pornography</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"> </p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">Postscript: clearly, I did not
keep my media-self-denying vow, to my bitter regret.<span> </span>It’s harder, of course, with everyone
phoning to ask after my daughter, sensationalised by coverage by more unbridled
pornography elsewhere. <span> </span>[Mrs
Kamahara is fine in Tokyo, a bit demoralised like others, about the ex-pats
leaving, but happy that her sister-in-law with a baby to feed has gone down to
the family in Nara. And she’s found toilet-paper.]</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">If you got this far, thanks for
reading it.</p>
<p style="margin: 4pt 0cm 0pt;" class="MsoNormal">Roger</p></font></div></div>
</blockquote></div><br>
</div></div></blockquote></div><br>