This presentation to the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication is connected to a larger work in progress on the epistemology of computational journalism. That project can be found at http://kimpearson.net/Factsproject.html

1. WANTED: AN
INCLUSIVE
EPISTEMOLOGY
OF JOURNALISM
WHOSE FACTS MATTER PANEL, AEJMC 2017
KIM PEARSON, THE COLLEGE OF NEW JERSEY

2. COMPUTATION
AL JOURNALISM:
A CHALLENGE,
AND AN
OPPORTUNITY
Journalism at scale
Rethinking inclusion
A culturally-responsive epistemology

3. JOURNALISM AT
SCALE:
FOR WHOM?
BASED ON
WHAT?
Robotic reporting
Who is writing the
algorithms?
How are reporting rules
and story structed?
Tech and journalism
diversity issues
Social computational
crowdsourcing and
verification
How do you avoid
enshrining bigotry?
Racism in Google images,
chat bots
Data mining
How is data vetted?
How are limitations
addressed?
GIGO – How, particularly,
do we contextualize faulty
historical data?

4. PARALLELS AND DISCONTINUITIES
Computational journalism era
• Journalism at scale
• Social computational methods
• Data mining and analysis
• Credibility as a market positioning
tool and civic imperative
“Objective” journalism
• New tech, design and business models
expanded methods for reaching audiences,
transmitting stories, images
• Emphasis on “credible” sourcing, reporting,
interviewing
• New social science methods: statistics,
cultural anthropology
• Credibility as a market positioning tool

5. LESSONS FROM AN EARLIER
ERA
• Several scholars, including David Mindich,
have pointed to ways in which “objective”
journalism at the turn of the 20th century was
compromised by ingrained biases.
• Ray Stannard Baker’s process in reporting his
1908 book, “Following the Color Line” serves
as an interesting case study because of his
use of authoritative black sources and social
science pointing to cultural, not biological
view of race.

6. RAY STANNARD BAKER 1870-1946
• Leading practitioner of New Journalism – interviews,
storytelling, design for readability
• Muckraker – worked with Lincoln Steffens, Ida Tarbell
• Wrote fiction as “David Grayson”
• Close to Woodrow Wilson – became his assistant,
biographer

7. FOLLOWING THE
COLOR LINE (1908)
• Prompted by Atlanta Riots of 1906, past
reporting on lynching
• Interviewed black and white sources
throughout South, North and Midwest
• Sent drafts for review to Du Bois, and
Booker T. Washington
• Du Bois challenged his representation of
white fear of black crime; Washington got
him to report on incarceration and use of
black convicts for profit
• Relies on elite representations of non-
elites – some of the elites happen to be
black

8. CORRESPONDENCE WITH DU BOIS

9. SAME DATA, DIFFERENT “TRUTHS”: WHY?

10. ECHOES OF THE PAST
Natalie Byfield reported the Central Park Jogger story, then studied the press coverage for her book, Savage Portrayals:"This case
became an extreme example of how new narratives about racial groups based on the notion of color-blind racism make it possible
for the use of racist tropes from the past and the existence of unequal racial outcomes to be dismissed by mainstream institutions as
having little or no relationship to the country's historical and material foundations of racial inequality."

11. AS WE BUILD
JOURNALISM’S
FUTURE
News, increasingly, is a designed product based on the
researched needs of a particular set of users. If we are to solve
the problem of generating news that is deemed credible
because it conforms to ingrained, but unsubstantiated bias, we
have to approach inclusion with an understanding of the ways
in which “objective” ways of knowing can subvert our search
for truth. Ramesh Srinavasan argues for an approach to
technology design that might be constructively adapted to
journalism. Like the traditional technology developer, the
“objective” journalist stands outside of a community.
Srinivasan criticizes social sciences that “remain closed to the
description, categorization and ontologies that fail to fit within
the Western or technocratic canon.” Rather, he advocates for
“praxis:” “a collaborative process by which we listen, learn and
practice humility.” (Whose Global Village)