Reading newspapers and listening to Radio 4 = passing my degree?

Friday's session was the first of our 'proper' journalism sessions (where we'll actually be looking at newspapers). 

From the title, you may think that anyone can pass a Journalism degree because a lot of people read newspapers and listen to a middle class radio station... (which I already listen to - especially Evan Davis' beautiful voice on 'Today').

Chris keeps telling us that reading newspapers is very important and I can see his point; we won't be able to become great journalists if we don't read great journalism.

One person from each seminar group has been given a newspaper to read, I've been given the task of reading 'The Independent', it costs £1 so I don't think I'll be buying it every day.  The Indie's sister paper 'i' is only 20p on weekdays, so I will probably buy that most days (to be honest, I think it's better than 'The Independent').

Here is the newspaper jargon given to us on Friday (some of which I already knew from GCSE Media Studies - thanks Mr Delaney!)

Standing head/Headline: This is basically just the article's headline!

Paras: These are the newspaper's columns.

Modular v.s. linear layout: Newspapers have different boxes and sections that a reader can dip in and out of. (TV and Radio programmes are linear as the viewer/listener can't choose what to watch or listen to - although lovers of certain pause and record TV services may dispute this.)

Barkers: These are very small sections usually above the name of the newspaper, these signal to the reader what pages certain news and features articles are on.

Content: This can be split into adverts and editorial.  We all know what adverts are, don't we?  Editorial is the news articles (but NOT the leading article) - the leading article/leader is COMMENT.

Advertorials: Magazines generally have these, an advertorial are advertising features made to look like articles; Top Gear usually have one or two per issue.

NEWS: This is VERY important for journalists as it is what they're paid to write about!  It can be split into scheduled and breaking.  Scheduled news is most of the news in newspapers e.g. the European Summit in Brussels last week, because we knew that it would be taking place.  Breaking news is news that newspapers don't expect to happen and don't expect to have to print e.g. if Nicholas Sarkozy's plane crashed on his shortness' way to the Euro Summit or events like The Hillsborough Disaster.

Features: These articles include comment, articles and other articles that don't come under the umbrella of news.

TB 2011