Journalist

A journalist is a person who practices journalism, the gathering and dissemination of information about current events, trends, issues and people.

Reporters are one type of journalist. They create reports as a profession for broadcast or publication in mass media such as newspapers, television, radio, magazines, documentary film, and the Internet. Reporters find the sources for their work; the reports can be either spoken or written; they are generally expected to report in the most objective and unbiased way to serve the public good.

Depending on the context, the term journalist also includes various types of Editors and visual journalists, such as photographers, graphic artists, and News design.

=Origin and scope of the term=

In the early 19th century, journalist meant simply someone who wrote for journals, such as Charles Dickens in his early career. In the past century it has come to mean a writer for newspapers and magazines as well.

Many people consider journalist interchangeable with reporter , a person who gathers information and creates a written report, or story. However, this overlooks many other types of journalists, including columnists, leader writers, photographers, editorial designers, and sub editors (British) or copy editors (American). The only major distinction is that designers, writers and art directors who work exclusively on advertising material - that is, material in which the content is shaped by the person buying the ad, rather than the publication - are not considered journalists.

Regardless of medium, the term journalist carries a connotation or expectation of professionalism in reporting, with consideration for truth and ethics although in some areas, such as the downmarket, scandal-led tabloids, the standards are deliberately negated.

=18th-century journalists=

*Daniel Defoe - as editor of the Review , he can claim to have invented many of the most popular formats, including the eye-witness report, the travel piece and the strongly opinionated column. Defoe s Review began publication on 19 February 1704 and lasted until 11 June 1713. He was also involved in several other periodicals, including The Master Mercury (1704), Mercator: or, Commerce Retrieved (1713-14), The Monitor (1714), The Manufacturer (1719-21), The Commentator (1720) and The Director (1720-1). *Richard Steele - founded and edited London-based periodicals including The Guardian and The Spectator in the early 1700s. *Joseph Addison - wrote many of the finest pieces in Steele s publications

=19th-century journalists=

*William Cowper Brann (1855-1898) - colorful editor of the Iconoclast in Waco, Texas. *Nellie Bly (1865-1922) - undercover journalism *Samuel Taylor Coleridge - political essays, poetry, and reportage *Charles Dickens (1812-1870) - started as a shorthand writer logging debates in the courts and Houses of Parliament before becoming a Parliamentary journalist *Henry Dunckley (1823- 1896), editor of Manchester Examiner and Times *Pierce Egan (1772-1849) - early sportswriter and reporter on popular culture *Rudyard Kipling (1865-1956) - newspaper editor and correspondent in India *Jacob Riis (1849-1914) - journalist and slum reformer *[http://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/0001/royall.html Anne Newport Royall] - crusading reporter, author, newspaper publisher, first journalist to publish an interview with a sitting US President *George Augustus Henry Sala (1828-1895) - editor and columnist

=20th-century print journalists=

Adams (1871–1958) - American investigative journalist

*Winston Churchill (1874-1965) war correspondent in the Boer War, captured by the Boers *Claud Cockburn (1904-1981) radical Irish journalist *C.P. Connolly (1863-1935) radical American investigative journalist associated for many years with Collier s Weekly . *Paul Foot (1938-2004) *Martha Gellhorn (1908-1998) war correspondent *Carl Gordon (1931-2002) - West of Scotland based Journalist and columnist for The Glasgow Herald *Emily Hahn (1905-1997) - wrote extensively on China *John L. Hess (1917-2005) - journalist, food critic for the New York Times *Pauline Kael (1919-2001) - Film critic for The New Yorker *Andrew Kopkind (1935-1994) - radical American journalist wrote extensively social movements in the 1960s *A.J. Liebling (1904-1963) American journalist closely associated with The New Yorker *Walter Lippmann (1889-1974) *Jonathan Meades *H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) - essayist, critic, and editor of The Baltimore Sun . *George Orwell (1903-1950) - reported on poverty, misery, and the Spanish Civil War *Robert Palmer (author/producer) (1945-1997) - first full-time, chief pop music critic for The New York Times , Rolling Stone contributing editor *William Rees-Mogg - editor of The Times newspaper from 1967 to 1981 *James Reston (1909-1995) - political commentator for the New York Times *Edward Said (1935-2003) - essayist, Palestinan activist *George Seldes (1890-1995) - American journalist, editor and publisher of In Fact . *George Bernard Shaw - better known as a playwright, but influential as a music writer and wrote other forms of journalism *Randy Shilts - reporter for The Advocate and San Francisco Chronicle. *Edgar Snow, pro-socialist journalist and writer, chronicled the Chinese revolution *I.F. Stone (1907-1989), investigative journalist, publisher of I.F. Stone s Weekly *Anna Louise Strong, pro-socialist journalist and writer *Walter Winchell (1897-1972), American political columnist, radio broadcaster

=20th-century broadcast journalists=

*Edward R. Murrow, CBS News radio correspondent in London Blitz, maker of TV documentary, noted interviewer *Walter Cronkite, former United Press correspondent, TV anchor for CBS News in the 1950s, 1960s *David Brinkley, television anchor and interview show host on the American networks American Broadcasting Company and NBC *Peter Jennings, television anchor for ABC *Jim Lehrer, anchor of The Newshour with Jim Lehrer *Tom Brokaw, television journalist and former anchor and managing editor of The NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw. *Dan Rather, succeeded Cronkite as managing editor and primary anchor of the CBS Evening News *Vernon Corea, a pioneering radio journalist and announcer with Radio Ceylon/SLBC and the BBC *Sorious Samura, CNN TV documentary maker from Sierra Leone *Fritz Spiegl, popularizer of classical music for the BBC *Brian Williams, succeeded Brokaw as managing editor and anchor of The NBC Nightly News. *Lowell Bergman, a television producer for the CBS news magazine 60 Minutes best known for investigating the tobacco industry.

=Internet-only journalists=

In recent years the numbers of journalists publishing only on the Internet, as opposed to print or broadcast journalists whose work also appears online, has grown enormously. Some of the best-known include:

*Matt Drudge - The first famous Internet-only journalist for his work around scandals of the Bill Clinton administration, in the United States. *Ana Marie Cox - works under the name Wonkette, known for humorous coverage of politics and life in Washington, D.C. *Richard Menta

= Journalists writing fiction =

There are many examples of journalists who made their mark writing fiction or other non-journalism, including:

*Anthony Burgess, who wrote vast quantities of reviews and was famously fired as literary critic of the Yorkshire Post *Amanda Craig, who writes satirical novels about English society *Joan Didion *Frederick Forsyth *David Gates (author), who wrote about books and music for Newsweek *Graham Greene who worked originally as sub-editor on The Times *Carl Hiaasen, who writes about the corruption and glitter of Miami and Miami Beach, which he also covered as a reporter. *Arturo Pérez Reverte and Manuel Leguineche were war correspondents before becoming successful Culture of Spain novelists. *Susan Sontag *Calvin Trillin, who has written several humorous novels *Tom Wolfe

= Modern journalists =

The explosion of modern media, including the creation of Internet-based news sources and the possibility that citizen journalism will greatly expand the field, has made it all but impossible to identify which journalists are notable, in the sense that they could be identified in the past.

=Fictional journalists=

: Main article: List of fictional journalists

Attributing the profession of journalist to a fictional character allows many possibilities:

The Action movie and adventure genres use reporters because they may travel extensively and are supposed to face risks.

**In the superhero subgenre, journalists may be among the first to have news of disasters and crimes, easing complications arising from maintaining a secret identity. Major superheroes like Clark Kent / Superman and Peter Parker / Spider-Man are journalists in their civil lives.

Journalists can provide a vehicle for the author to explain complex things. For instance, Guy Hamilton and Billy Kwan make sense of the politics of Indonesia in the early 1960s for the Western viewers of The Year of Living Dangerously , and Ernest Hemingway s alter ego introduces Spain to Anglo readers of The Sun Also Rises .

Many fiction writers like Hemingway and Arturo Pérez Reverte use their professional background as journalists to create their fiction characters.

==See also== *copy editor *Editor *foreign correspondent *journalism scandals *Lists of authors *objectivity (journalism) *Reporters sans frontières (Reporters Without Borders) *scientific journalist *sportswriter *war correspondent *newsroom *inverted pyramid - generally accepted method for composing a news story *International Freedom of Expression Exchange - monitors attacks on journalists *Society of Professional Journalists - US professional organization *Canadian Journalists for Free Expression

=External links=

*[http://www.caj.ca/ Canadian Association of Journalists] *[http://www.ifj.org/ International Federation of Journalists] *[http://www.nuj.org.uk/ National Union of Journalists (UK)&(ROI)] *[http://www.alliance.org.au/ Media, Arts and Entertainment Alliance (Australia)] *[http://www.cpj.org/ Journalism.org: The Online Home of the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Committee of Concerned Journalists] *[http://www.ire.org/ Investigative Reporters and Editors] *[http://www.cpj.org/ Committee to Protect Journalists] *[http://www.journalismnet.com/ The Investigative Guide to Internet Research] *[http://www.theage.com.au/news/Opinion/The-write-stuff/2005/03/20/1111253883620.htmloneclick=true The write stuff ]. . *[http://www.mp3newswire.net/stories/5002/journalist.html What Makes a Journalist] - March 5, 2005 article in support of blogging as a form of journalism.