The beginning of the Week 8 module includes a quote: “Embedding is a fancy word for letting journalists go see what the military units do.” However, upon reading and listening to the award-winning stories included in this week’s assignment, it is clear that embedded reporting goes much beyond that description. Embedded journalists have the opportunity to use their own first-hand, lived experience to convey details of a crisis to readers.
Caitlin Dickerson’s “Seventy Miles in the Darién Gap” showcases a different type of war than the one I initially pictured from the preceding quotation – this time a war between humans and nature. In reading this piece, I thought a lot about the process journalists must undergo to embed within stories, and the subsequent challenges and rewards reaped by this process. In experiencing this grueling journey with her subjects, Dickerson gains their trust and builds a shared sense of companionship, both of which are felt by the reader. Additionally, in creating these relationships, she not only writes a deeper, more resonant story but also gets to share the lives of people who would never have gotten their stories told otherwise. However, once Dickerson returns to the U.S. she resumes her normal life. What happens to migrants as they continue their journey? It is a struggle felt by journalists and their readers alike – where does the story really end? When journalists embed themselves within the lives of others, it is hard to know when the reporting stops and when a journalist has done their due diligence in reporting a subject’s story. I imagine this must be an immensely challenging decision and step to take.
In The Dark’s reporting of war crimes committed in Haditha, Iraq doesn’t seem to necessarily face the same challenges. Investigating a crime that occurred four years prior allows reporters to go down different paths of probing – following contrasting opinions, recollections, and explanations, interviewing individuals connected to the story in different ways. It also brings up the question of what the sphere of embedded reporting actually encompasses. New Yorker reporter Madeleine Baran could not move with troops and live the moment with them as the crime occurred years prior. However, Baran does follow the story closely enough, with a plethora of first-hand testimonies from different witnesses, to feel as though journalists and readers are embedded within the story. In this way, the phrase does seem to encompass this stunning work of investigative journalism.
In conclusion, embedded journalism seems to represent the most intense form of immersion in storytelling. In blurring the line between observing and participating, journalists are able to witness to history occurring in real time, whether in the jungle or on the battlefield, and provide readers with the most accurate and up-to-date look into global crises.
