These readings made me think more about the role of journalists who do not need to be experiencing the trauma and hardships of the population on which they are reporting, but choose to do so out of a sense of duty. On the one hand, it’s very brave. Cailin Doornbos refers to a “journalistic duty” she felt to travel to Ukraine and discover why Western weapons are so critical to Kyiv’s fight. I found her storytelling most effective in the description of the secret repair facilities which so few can access. This was the most unique aspect of her reporting and the images of Ukrainians caring so intently for destroyed Western weapons and “cannibalizing” really communicated the extent to which Ukraine depends on Western weapons.
Doornbos lost me in the end, though. It was the final sentence that frustrated me: “While they still need additional military aid, the impact past donations have had on their fight is not forgotten by those whose lives depended on it. And I think that’s something we, as Americans, can take pride in.” Why is this necessary? Why not just tell us the story and let us make the judgment of whether or not to be proud as Americans of the impact our donations have had on the fight? It felt, frankly, unjournalistic and also not very interesting. What do others think about this?
Caitlin Dickerson’s Seventy Miles in Hell gripped me the whole time. I had read the piece before and am always shocked by how many nationalities are represented among the migrants in the Darien Gap. Dickerson’s immersive reporting allows her to capture nuances that would be difficult from afar: the interactions between the guides and the migrants, for example, and the role of the Indigenous Panamanians, and the bandits. While one could use reconstruction to achieve some of Dickerson’s physical descriptions, I don’t think it would be possible to communicate the moment when Maria Fernanda covers her eyes as her 7-year-old-daughter crosses the rock and says “Hold on tight, my princess!” without being there in person.
This left me with the question: how do you know when you need to be there to report a story? Maybe, like Doornbos, you’ve been reporting on the same topic for a while. What tells you: It’s time for me to go actually embed in this place, and that’s the only way I can find out the information I need and tell the story that must be told, even if it’s dangerous?
I really appreciated Ceci’s comment about how we might practice embedding differently under constraints of time (and space) perhaps using video calls or social media. This reminded me of the most striking piece of embedded journalism I’ve encountered this year — the two episodes of This American Life featuring Banias, a 9-year-old girl in Gaza who reporter Chana Joffe-Walt has been speaking with over the phone for months. To get to know Banias, Chana just calls her on the phone, or facetimes her, for hours, allowing the child to dictate the nature of their calls. Banias gives her virtual house tours of a home once filled with nearly 80 relatives and describes her daily routine of “playing school” with other children, with the oldest taking on the role of teachers. She says things like “oh, here comes a bomb,” as casually as if she was announcing the arrival of the daily newspaper. Banias is a lens into the war so few can attain, and the medium of radio is the perfect way to introduce it to a broader audience. As a listener, I felt so embedded in her voice and her story that I needed to sit on my kitchen floor for a good few minutes after hearing the interview, the only time any piece of journalism has produced such a reaction in me.
