Grassroots Journalism isn’t new, but I’d anticipated there was always going to be something different about The Eclipse. Its purpose wasn’t to fill a local news gap. Instead, the idea was to equip and empower local people to hear each other’s stories, identify and investigate issues and increase our awareness of the world around us.

By producing a tabloid-style newspaper, we aspired to tackle many of society’s most difficult questions by giving them a local face. But how do you empower a room full of people with no experience of journalism, with the appropriate skills and confidence to achieve such an ambition? Our answer was the Do It Ourselves Journalism (DOIJ) course.

This case study is based in my own eye-opening experience of the very first DIOJ course and, later, the production of The Eclipse newspaper. Although, I’m a university researcher, familiar with research and writing, on that very first evening I was as new to the approach of journalism as everyone else in the room. And just as apprehensive…

THE STORYTELLERS & THEIR STORIES:

Perhaps the most exciting thing at the beginning was how diverse the group was. All volunteers, we ranged in age from the early 20’s to sixty or more. The group was multi-ethnic, more-or-less balanced by gender, and with significant differences in experience of education, wealth and health.

Reasons for being there were varied – a journalism student wanting experience, someone wanting to express their frustrations at an unfair health and welfare system, another venture for a lifelong activist, and others keen for recovery after the divisive nature of the Brexit referendum.

For seven sessions over 14 weeks, among other things, we learnt how to research stories, write in a way that catches and keeps the reader’s interest, stay on the right side of the law, and enhance a story with images and infographics.

The pace was good, never overwhelming. On reflection everything, even the downtime for personal interactions, seemed to be part of the learning process.

Introducing ourselves, we began the “active listening” so important to researching an in-depth story. And, while the idea of eventually writing a story of our own was somewhat nerve-wracking, each session was always both relaxing and fun.

Inventing hilarious tabloid headlines helped us look deeper into a front-page story, whilst encouraging us as a group to identify alternative headlines. Making fun of tabloid headlines in this way helped us establish an idea of how tabloids work, and what we would like to see as an alternative.

We also explored how to get below the surface of a story. Most newspaper articles, we were informed, are like the small part of the iceberg you can see. We wanted to add depth to the most challenging stories; to listen to the group’s personal reflections, research the context, illustrate the data, and consider resolutions or alternatives. In other words, we wanted to reveal the other nine-tenths of the iceberg that is hidden below the surface.

PUTTING PLAY INTO PRACTICE:

Toward the end of the course, we were encouraged to submit ideas for our own stories that we would research and write. Several of us joined together in small teams – some would do background research, some would take photos, some would write. Not all ideas were developed, but support from professional journalists was available for those who did take their ideas forward.

The articles in the first edition of The Eclipse reflected the varied interests of the group and certainly didn’t shy away from difficult subjects. One story put a real local face to Ken Loach’s recent film I, Daniel Blake, and George and Yvonne’s story covered the precarious situation of a valued mental health service, whilst also being intensely personal.

Despite early intentions to keep the process “democratic” and open, as we got closer to publication, the editorial effort became concentrated into fewer hands. Our journalist friends had said this was inevitable. But, once printed, The Eclipse became a group effort again.

In addition to stacking papers in the usual places, cafes, pubs, hairdressers, we took to the streets. Standing in cities, towns and village centres, we delivered the newspaper direct into people’s hands, whilst initiating conversation and connection with passers-by.

REFLECTIONS:

A few months after The Eclipse landed, the group reassembled to discuss a second edition. We started the process by reflecting on what had worked well, and not so well, with the first edition. New faces appeared – people who had been drawn in after seeing the first paper. One said “I just admired it”, while others were drawn to “make some kind of difference” but recognised that it was “not magic, but hard work”.

Later, reflecting back on producing that first edition, Andrew Wilson (one of the projects early initiators) said he’d been impressed with how differences in opinion had been handled by the group. Throughout each phase the room for discussion and conversation, however informal, had created space for open debate, relationship building, and peer-support. It was this process that enabled the group to grow in confidence, and for many of us to identify, articulate, investigate, and then publish our stories as citizen journalists!