Tell Our Story. Julie Reid
is no one voice (singular), but a multiplicity of voices (plural). It follows then that we ought to be deeply suspicious when an institution, whose responsibility is to inform us of the events of the world, reports these from a singular (dominant) position.
Clearly, the overarching concept of voice described above involves a great many things. But, from this point on in this book, we will narrow our use of the term ‘voice(s)’ to a more specific connotation. That is not to exclude the importance of the concept and the process as a whole, but we do this here for simplicity and brevity. We include the bracketed ‘(s)’ on the end of the term to invoke the possibility of the plural and to indicate a recognition that there is always more than one solitary voice related to any particular situation, story and context. For the purposes of the remainder of this book, voice(s) points to the narratives and stories of the people this book is about – the members of grassroots communities, who, all of them, have important stories to tell, whose experiences of events have implications for a broader society, country and political landscape, but whose version of events and experiences have been habitually ignored and/or misrepresented by the dominant news media.
In this book, we often refer to what we have termed the ‘dominant media’ for the purposes of our discussion. So what/who do we mean by the dominant media? For us, the dominant media ought to be understood less in terms of the formal structures of media ownership, but more in respect of the direction of the national narrative. That is, the myriad collection of media reports, journalists, editors, articles, broadcasts and media outlets, which collectively direct the trajectory of public discourse on any particular issue towards the same or a similar cohesive understanding of events. In overly simple terms, it is the various news media outlets and reports that all sing to the same tune, and which report on the same events in the same ways. The dominant media is then comprised of media outlets that may fall within the stable of privately owned, corporatised media conglomerates or public service media institutions, but which all behave in accordance with the dominant narrative.
We have selected the term ‘dominant’ to remain in keeping with Stuart Hall’s (1980) outstanding and still relevant explanation of how perspectives (readings) can vary – the ‘dominant’ one, however, primarily orientated toward the status quo. But as much as our different perspectives and readings of events can vary, so too can our retelling of them. This book is about how there are stories, many stories, to be told about any particular scene or situation. And about how the dominant media regularly ignores most of them, in favour of telling only one story.
Importantly, the dominant media maintains the facade of professional journalism in pursuit of truth and in adherence with the highest order of media ethics. The dominant media must mythologise the profession in this way in order to ensure its own credibility. The remainder of this book, however, exposes this facade for what it is – a myth. Roland Barthes ([1957] 1972) formulates a semiotic model for the function of communicated myth, which acts as a mode of speech that is ideologically infused, but which can often operate so unobtrusively that the message is simply accepted as fact, as natural, as entirely justifiable and as the way things are. Simply, a myth is a mode of communicating an idea, the motivations of which are concealed, and the content of which is largely inaccurate, but which dupes people into believing it anyway.
In this book we have focused on three politically, socially and economically marginalised communities involved in differing struggles for social justice: these are the communities of Glebelands, Xolobeni/Amadiba and Thembelihle in South Africa. But many other marginalised groups or communities have suffered a similar non-recognition of their own voice(s) by the dominant media. We mention this here, and highlight the findings of related research studies, conducted independently of our own, to demonstrate how this media behaviour is not unique or isolated to the stories of Glebelands, Xolobeni/Amadiba and Thembelihle.
WHAT DO WE ALREADY KNOW ABOUT THE NEWS MEDIA AND VOICE(S)?
A number of other recent research studies confirm the critique that we deliver here, that the dominant media does not offer adequate voice(s) and representation to the majority of citizens, who in South Africa predominantly are the poor. For example, a 2013 study (Malila 2013), which focused on the youth as media consumers, explored the relationships between young research participants and the media. The study highlights that young, poor, black South Africans feel mostly disconnected from the majority of news media content. Participants expressed the concern that they do not ‘see’ themselves in the news media, the content of which holds little relevance to their concerns, interests and lives. While South African society is bottom heavy and comprised of a large youth segment, little media content concerns the interests of the youth.
According to Jane Duncan (2013b): ‘With the exception of education, youth input on issues of importance was minimal, with practically no youth input on crime. Young men were more prominent in the coverage than young women.’ With close to 1000 young people surveyed in four provinces, these young people remarked on the dearth of in-depth reporting that was relevant to them. The media’s failure to engage and listen to youth voice(s), and to act as an enabler for young peoples’ developing civic and political identities, is striking.
In another example, in 2014, Vanessa Malila presented the findings of a news content analysis study. It revealed how the news media routinely fails to enable young persons to act as informed and engaged citizens due to neglect of representing content regarding public discourses that impact the youth. Focusing on education, the study emphasises that the news media habitually fails to provide relevant information that could be of importance to the youth in respect of education coverage. Furthermore, news reporting on education does not feature the voices, opinions or perspectives of young people – the self-same people who ought to be at the centre of the story. That young, poor, black South Africans do not recognise themselves, their interests or their communities in the dominant media, that they are not consulted, heard or listened to as a means of informing the news reporting that is directly relevant to them, is testament to the lack of engagement between the media and the majority of South Africans. The year following the publication of Malila’s study saw the advent of the #FeesMustFall student-led protest movement across South Africa. While the main impetus of this movement was aimed at transforming the higher education environment, the veracity and widespread enthusiasm that characterised youth involvement in #FeesMustFall bore testament to a broad youth frustration at their lack of collective voice. Here, mass protest became the only means by which the youth were able to have their voice(s) heard or taken seriously by the establishment.
Let us shift focus for a minute, from the youth to another under-represented, marginalised and stereotyped segment of society, and one that comprises just over half of all people alive in the world: women. A 2013 report conducted by the media monitoring company, Media Tenor, found that women’s voices are routinely under-represented in the news media, and on television women accounted for only 14 per cent of coverage in South Africa (Duncan 2013b). This problem is not only endemic to South Africa, but in most regions of the world.
In 2014 the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) released its report, ‘World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development’, which highlighted the global extent of the matter. Women constitute less than a quarter (24 per cent) of the persons heard or represented in traditional news media, but, even worse, women comprise only a fifth of authoritative news voices quoted in the news (20 per cent of experts and 19 per cent as spokespersons). News outlets looking for expert comment or interviewees on matters of societal, legal, political or economic importance will consult a man about 81 per cent of the time (UNESCO 2014). Women working in the media sector, who are best placed to increase the gendered diversity of news media reporting, are often shifted to ‘soft news’ beats, relegated to covering topics traditionally considered to be more feminine, such as celebrity gossip or fashion news, while their male colleagues report on the important stuff, such as politics and the economy.
In 2018, I was asked to assist with the editorial work on the more recent 2018 edition of the UNESCO World Trends report. While studying the findings compiled for each of the six world regions, I discovered how the position of women in the media sector and their levels of representation had not only stagnated rather than improved since 2014, but in some regions and contexts had actually regressed (UNESCO 2018).
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