UNESCO is the lead UN Agency for promoting freedom of expression and safety of journalists as part of its mandate to “promote the free flow of ideas by word and image”.
David Cheruiyot
Assistant Professor at Centre for Media and Journalism Studies, the University of Groningen, The Netherlands , The Netherlands
digital journalism digital media/press criticism metajournalistic discourse media accountability professionalism comparative studies
My research broadly focuses on the transformation of the profession of journalism in today's digitally networked world and mostly rests at the intersection of digital journalism and media accountability studies. My special interest is in the critics (who are mostly users of blogs and social media) and their criticisms of traditional media. My PhD dissertation, titled “Criticising Journalism: Popular Media Criticism in the Digital Age”, examined critics and criticisms of the mainstream media in digital spaces and their influence on journalism practice. The research was based on a contextual comparative case study of Kenyan and South African journalistic cultures. I have coined the term ‘digital media criticism’ to mean publicly shared evaluations and judgements of journalistic text and actors in digital spaces.
Definition of journalists' safety
I mainly view journalistic safety from a risk-to-journalism perspective. The risk perspective describes the insecurities, threats, harms and challenges to journalism when it entered a “risk society” (Beck, 1992) in the digital age. In my research on digital media criticism, the risks implied are the vulnerabilities that digital publicity engenders, professional consciousness of the potential dangers in a digital discursive ecology, as well as journalists’ perceptions of how to grasp such risks. The risks of criticism are considered to emerge from a rejection of rationality and an open gate to discourses that reinforce anti-press sentiment in digital spaces. As participants in a digital discursive ecology, journalists are inevitably faced with the risk of digital publicity, where in the course of their practice (production, distribution and dissemination of news) they are inevitably exposed to a turbulent space.Future plans for research on journalists' safety
My future research will shift to interrogating the causes of risks to journalism that eventually threaten the safety to journalists. In other words, why (and even, when) critics threaten harm to journalists. This will perhaps will inform research into how these risks can be managed, controlled or prevented.- Research focuses:
- Digital
- Methods used in research:
- Interviews
- Countries of research focus:
- Kenya and South Africa (but I have also done related research in other nations in Sub-Sahara Africa)
Areas interested in collaborating with NGOs
I am interested in NGOs that focus on media/journalistic accountability and/or how to improve relations between professional journalists and audiences (as described as critics, citizens, consumers or merely the 'general' public)Areas interested in collaborating with other researchers
Mostly in the areas of criticism of journalists and risks to journalism.
David Cheruiyot
Groningen, The Netherlands
University of Groningen, Oude Kijk in Het Jatstraat, 26 9712 EK
