Campus Compact » Journalism

Investigative Journalism

tdomf_26a6d — Mon, 29 Jan 2001 00:00:00 +0000

REQUIRED TEXTS.
David Protess and Rob Warden. A Promise of Justice. New York: Hyperion, 1998. Barry Scheck, Peter Neufeld and Jim Dwyer. Actual Innocence. New York: Doubleday, 2000.

OVERVIEW

This course will explore the watchdog role of journalists in American society. The tradition of investigative reporters who expose wrongdoing and sometimes crusade for change has a long and proud history that stands alongside more conventional journalistic practices. We will examine that tradition by learning the reporting techniques that allow both print and broadcast stories to be told and by understanding the societal factors that shape their content and impact.

Our focus will be on stories about wrongly held convictions – that is, exposes of miscarriages of justice. We will examine the root causes of wrongful convictions, assess the scope of the problem and discuss ways to determine the presence of injustice.

Further, we will use advanced reporting methods – public records, database searches, interviewing and other techniques – to investigate evidence of real-world miscarriages of justice. The primary goal of the fieldwork component is educational: to learn investigative journalism by practicing it. Additional goals include experiencing the quest for truth, and, where the truth is that an injustice has occurred, finding paths to right that wrong.

In sum, the course will immerse students in the theory and practice of watchdog journalism as applied to the criminal justice system.

The course will combine class sessions with extensive field experience. The class sessions will include lectures and discussions of the journalistic, legal and societal underpinnings of the subject. The experiential learning will involve investigative reporting, by teams of students, of four criminal cases. The Classes and fieldwork will be augmented by audiovisual presentations of investigative stories and guest speakers who have first-hand knowledge of the subject, including journalists, attorneys and former prisoners who were convicted of crimes they did not commit. At least one event will be sponsored by Northwestern's Center on Wrongful Convictions, a new Medill-Law School project. (The instructor will describe the relationship between the Center and this course on the first day of class.)

The class sessions will be held on Mondays from 3 to 6 p.m., but occasional weekends or evenings will be necessary to do team reporting or accommodate guest speakers. Whenever possible, team meetings will be held during regular class hours, either in Fisk 207 or B 18.

The following topics will be covered this quarter:

March 27: The Role of the Journalist in Exposing Miscarriages of Justice

April 3: What Causes Wrongful Convictions? How Can a Journalist Spot a Credible Claim of Innocence?
Assignment: Scheck et al., Actual Innocence; Chicago Tribune, "Trial and Error" (handout)

April 10: The Paper Trail: Finding and Interpreting Legal Documents Assignment: Review case files (in B 18)

April 17: The People Trail: Investigative Interviewing Techniques
Assignment: IRE reading materials (handout)

April 24: Panel Discussion of the "Ford Heights Four" case Assignment: Protess and Warden, A Promise of Justice

TBA: NU Center on Wrongful Convictions – Public Forum

June 5: Presentations of Students' Reporting Projects/Popular Portrayals of Legal Injustice (Watch and Discuss Movie) Assignment: see EVALUATION

A bibliography of supplementary readings accompanies this syllabus.
(Note: Legal and ethical concerns will be part of each class discussion rather than being considered separately.)

EVALUATION:

1. Team reporting project. Students will work in teams doing investigative reporting of cases that must have had unjust results. The specific cases will be discussed the first two weeks of class and, no later than April 10, students will choose the case they will investigate. Each team ultimately will prepare a memorandum of investigative findings accompanied by interview notes and any documents obtained during reporting. These written materials will be turned-in on June 5 and presented to the instructor and the rest of the class. Students will receive both an individual and group grade (weighted equally) that together will be 75 percent of the grade for the course. Note: The instructor will provide verbal evaluations of individual and group performance as the quarter progresses.

2. Attendance and participation. Class attendance and participation is essential. In addition, students are expected to be actively involved and helpful to other students in the team reporting project. As much as one-third of a letter grade may be added to or subtracted from the final grade based on performance in class and team activities.

3. Historical profile. (Optional for continuing students). Each student will profile a person who was wrongly convicted of a famous crime in American history. The profile should describe the case and analyze the variety of factors that contributed to the miscarriage of justice. Particular attention should be paid to the role of the media in covering the case and, where applicable, exposing the injustice. Length guideline: 1,500 – 2,000 words. Due date: April 17. 25 percent of the final grade. Profile subjects will be distributed on the first day of class.

American Children on the Margins: A Documentary Approach

tdomf_26a6d — Mon, 29 Jan 2001 00:00:00 +0000

Alex Harris, Center for Documentary Studies
Kirk Felsman, Center for Documentary Studies

OVERVIEW:
Increasingly, attention to the status of children in the United States, particularly those in poor and immigrant communities, has suffered from superficial and sensationalized coverage in both the popular press and in the advocacy reports of various intervening agencies. Consequently, the views and aspirations of these populations have often been misrepresented, the general public's understanding has been seriously distorted and important opportunities to influence critical policy decisions have been missed.

This seminar is not intended to provide an exhaustive review of all the major child policy issues of current concern in the United States. Rather, we win give consideration to selected policy questions that relate to particular groups of children, and at the same time, from a historical perspective, examine the ways in which documentary work has been drawn upon to inform policy makers and the general public and affect change.

Students in the seminar will explore the status of American children and adolescents through involvement in individual, service-oriented projects in local communities.

Students are expected to engage in a community- service activity that brings them into direct contact with children and/or adolescents for at least three hours on a weekly basis. This might take the form of tutoring, acting as a teacher's aide, being a big brother/sister, coaching a team, or the like. Students will be required to write weekly documentary papers integrating their service experience with the readings and class discussions.

The class will also study historical and contemporary literary, policy, and documentary works on the status of children. Selected photographs will be shown regularly during class periods. For comparative purposes we will draw upon work from international settings.

Main Texts: (Available from the Regulator Book Shop)
1) Wilkomirski, B., Frazments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood
2) Butler, R.O., A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
3) Kotlowitz, A., There are No Children Here
4) Williams, W.C., The Doctor Stories
5) Ellison, R., Invisible Man
6) Finnegan, W., Cold New World
7) Coles, R., Lee, J., & Moses, J., The Youngest Parents

EVALUATION:
Course Participation: 25%
Community Service: 25%
Weekly Writing Assignments (approx. 3-5 pages each): 50%

Alex Harris and Kirk Felsman will share the teaching of the seminar and comments on papers. Class preparation, regular attendance and participation are essential. The community service requirement includes a bi-weekly group meeting outside of class. These sessions are intended to provide students with an additional venue in which to discuss their service learning experiences and receive observations from a childcare professional.

Short, weekly documentary papers linking course materials and students' hands-on experience are required and will be due (two copies) the end of every class from September 9th through December 9th. A one-paragraph description of the community service placement is due (two copies) at the end of class on September 9th. Students should schedule an individual, mid-term meeting with each professor by October 21st. Though formal mid-term grades will not be issued, these meetings will provide students a clear sense of how they are doing academically.

Class Schedule:

September 2nd – Memories of Childhood
Readings:
1) Harris, A. (1987) in A World Unsuspected: Portraits of Southern Childhood
UNC Press, Selected sections: Introduction (xiii-xx.), My Real Invisible Self
(1-13); Hitting Back (14-35), Didn't Mean Goodbye (36-52); Going Up to Atlanta
(78-107); The Power and the Glory (108-126); A Secret You Can't Break Free
(210-234)

Photographs in Class: an overview of documentary photography with a focus on the south

September 9th -Who is a child?

Readings:
1) Wilkormiski, B. (1996) Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood
Schocken Books: New York.
2) Ewald, W., "Dreams" Summer 1995, DoubleTake #1, pages 34-49
2) Graves, K, "Story" Spring 1996, DoubleTake #4, pages 45-51

Photographs in Class: an overview of previous Duke student photographs of children and adolescents in the Triangle
* A one paragraph description of community service activities is due (2 copies)

September 16th – Methods and Ethics Readings:
1) Stolar, D. "City Map" Spring 1997, Doubletake #8, pages 68-72
2) Williams, W. C., "The Doctor Stories," Selected stories: Old Doc Rivers (13-41);
The Girl With the Pimply Face (42-55); The Use of Force (56-60); Jeane Beicke
(69-77); A Face of Stone (78-87); The Insane (104-107), The Practice (104-107)
3) Eldon, D. "The Journals of Dan Eldon," Fall, 1995, DoubleTake #2, pages 138-144

Photographs in Class: Sally Mann's family photographs, and Abraham Menasch's "Inner Grace"
Film: The Postmaster, Satyajit Ray, 1961

September 23rd – Childcare and Early Education
Readings:
1) Greenhouse, S., 1995, "If the French can do it why can't we?", New York Times Magazine, Nov. 14.
2) Lardner, J. "Separate Lives", Spring 1997, DoubleTake, #8 pages 54-67
3) Duffy, P. "From the Nannies Series", Spring 1997, DoubleTake, #8, pages 59-67
4) Nixon, N. & Nixon, B. "Room 306", Spring 1996, DoubleTake, #4, pages 52-64
5) Ewald W., "Black Self/White Self", Summer 1996, DoubleTake, #5. pages 54-66
Photographs in Class: Alex Harris' documentary work in Philadelphia inner-city Schools in the spring of 1999

September 30th – Children in the Inner City
Readings:
1) Kotlowitz, A. (1991) There Are No Children Here, Delacorate Press: New York
2) Morse, E., "Ghetto Life 101". "Remorse: The 14 Stories of Eric Morse", CD – National Public Radio (199??)
3) Garbarino, J. et. al., (1992), "The developmental toll of inner-city life", pages 48–66, in Children in Danger, Jossey-Bass: San Francisco

Photographs in Class: Helen Levitt's and Bruce Davidson's photographs from the streets of New York
Film: "In the Street", Helen Levitt ( in class)

October 7th – Orphans and Homeless Children
Readings:
1) Cohen, C., Hendler, N. (1998) No Home Without Foundation, Women's Commission on Refugee Women and Children, New York.
3) Toth, J., (1997) Orphans of the Living New York, Touchstone Books, pages 13-73
4) Goldstein, R. "Floating Homes", Fall 1996, DoubleTake #6, pages 117-121

Photographs in Class: Noah Hendler in Rwanda and Malawi, Fazal Sheikh's images of mothers and children, and children's drawings from Bosnia

October 14th – Street Children
Readings:
1) Felsman, JK, (1995) "Risk and resiliency in childhood: The lives of street children", in The Child In Our Times: Studies in the Development of Resiliency (Eds.) Dugan, TA Coles, R., pages 56-80.
2) Riis, J. (1918) "The street Arabs", in How the Other Half Lives pages 147-158
3) Poinatowski, E., and Klish K. "In the Street," Winter 1998, DoubleTake #11, pages 117-129

Photographs in Class: Lauren Greenfield's "Fast Forward — Growing up in the Shadow of Hollywood"
Film: Los Olvidados, Luis Bunuel, 1950

October 21st – Refugee and Immigrant Children
Readings:
1) Butler. R.O.. 1992) A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain, New York:H. Holt, selected stories: The Trip Back (2944); Crickets (59-64); Letters from My Father (65-72); Mid Autumn (95-102); In the Clearing (103-110)
2) Hoenig, L, "Refuge", Fall 1995, DoubleTake #2, pages 85-94
3) Epstein, M. "In Vietnam and Versailles," Fall 1995, DoubleTake #2 pages 68-85
4) Cohen, C. & Hendler, N., Looking Towards Home, Women's Commission for Refugee Women and Children/UNHCR, 1999.

Photographs in Class: Alex Harris' work with Cambodian Children in Washington DC mid 1980's, Current Duke Student photographs of refugee and immigrant children and adolescents

October 28th- Child Labour Readings:
1) Finnegan, W. (1998) "Work Boy: New Haven", in Cold New World, Random House: New York, pages 1-92
2) Urrea, L.A., and Leuders-Booth, J. "Dompe Days", Winter 1996, DoubleTake #3, pages 132-136
3) America and Lewis Hine (on reserve)

Photographs in Class: Child labor by Lewis Hine, migrant workers by Wendy Ewald, Ken Light, and Herbert Emmet

November 4th – Street Gangs
Readings:
1) Finnegan, W., (1998) La vida loca: The Yakima Valley", in Cold New World, Random House: New York, pages 209-268
2) D'Amato, P., "Barrio", Summer 1995, DoubleTake #1, pages 94-109
3) DeCesare, D.,"In Progress", Summer 1995, DoubleTake #1, pages 16-17

Photographs in Class: Larry Clark and Donna, DeCesare on Gangs

November 11th – Young Parents
Readings:
1) Moses, J., Coles, R., (1998) The Youngest Parents, New York: WW Norton/DoubleTake
2) Furstenberg, F., (1988), "Good dads, bad dads" in Changing American Family and Public Policy, Washington, D.C.: Urban Institute Press.
Photographs in Class: John Moses and Jocelyn Lee on teen parents,
Margaret Sartor on young women in the South

November 18th – Juvenile Justice
Readings:
1) Ellison, R. (1947) Invisible Man Vintage Books: New York Note: To be discussed November 18th & December 2nd
2) Archey, D., (1996) "Children, Genocide & Justice", Save the Children, Kigali, Rwanda
3) Courtwright., D. (1996) "Ghetto violence", "The crack era" and "Life in the new frontier society", in Violent Land: Single Men and Social Disorder from the Frontier to the Inner City pages 225-280, Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA

Photographs in Class: Paul Kwilecki and Thomas Roma in the courthouse

December 2nd – Race, Social Class & Historical Moment
Readings:
1) Ellison, R. (1947) Invisible Man, Vintage Books: New York
2) Finnegan, W., (1998) "The unwanted: The Antelope Valley", pages 269-351, in Cold New World, Random House: New York

Photographs in Class: to be announced

December 9th – Final Discussion